


Walk A Mile

by gmariam



Category: Torchwood
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-09-27
Updated: 2015-10-07
Packaged: 2018-04-23 13:39:45
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 13
Words: 40,340
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4878937
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/gmariam/pseuds/gmariam
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>An unusual alien artifact leaves Jack and Ianto with a better understanding of one another than ever before.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. The Switch

When Jack and Ianto walked into the Hub late that afternoon, they were both dirty, covered in blood (red and a sticky, sickly green) and obviously pissed off at one another. It was so bad that neither man bothered to hide it from the rest of the team, which was far more unusual for them than being covered in green blood.

Jack threw a piece of alien tech—an odd looking metal contraption twisted into knots—onto Tosh's desk. Tosh was fairly certain she saw a hole in the captain's shirt, and a rather large, bloody one at that. Ianto ignored them both, storming off in the other direction, a deep cut on the side of his head trailing blood down his face, bruises darkening around his neck.

"Check it out, Tosh, but be careful," Jack said, his voice curt. "If it's what I think it is, it could be dangerous, but I'm pretty sure it's broken." With that he literally stomped into his office and slammed the door. Ianto turned and glared at the closed door, his eyes narrowing before he whirled around.

"I'll be in the showers," he snapped, leaving Tosh slightly speechless as Ianto stalked away, muttering darkly under his breath.

Tosh watched him leave before Gwen and Owen appeared behind her, both talking at once.

"What was that about?"

"They're having a bloody domestic, that's what it is."

"Must have been a difficult retrieval," said Tosh to stop them gossiping too much. "They were gone all afternoon, and they're both bloodied up." She glanced back at them. "Maybe Jack died."

"They'll shag it off later," said Owen knowingly. "Although, I should probably take a look at Teaboy's head first."

"Should I talk to Jack?" asked Gwen, glancing skeptically at the office.

"Does he usually talk to you about his rows with Ianto?" asked Tosh. Owen raised an eyebrow in curious anticipation.

"No," Gwen admitted. "I didn't think they rowed that much. Or if they do, they're usually much better at hiding it."

"Then I wouldn't go near either one of them for several hours," said Owen, and Gwen nodded in agreement.

"So what have we got?" asked Owen, obviously trying to direct their attention away from the tension between Jack and Ianto and back toward the strange device on Tosh's workstation. "Looks like it could be interesting."

Tosh picked up a scanner and began going over it. "Maybe. I'm not picking up any energy readings at all, so whatever it does, Jack's probably right and it's—"

Before she could finish her sentence the device popped open, the knots untangling; it lit up, spun around, and promptly closed again. As they all stepped back, wondering what had just happened, there were almost simultaneous shouts from the direction of both Jack's office and the showers. Tosh, Gwen, and Owen exchanged wide-eyed glances before Jack came running out of his office, shirtless, and Ianto came bounding upstairs without any trousers.

"What the hell was that?" shouted Ianto. He sounded different, somehow.

"What did you do?" growled Jack, his voice lower and more…Welsh sounding.

The three of them stared at the two men, who were glaring at one another with almost as much confusion and surprise as anger.

"I didn't do anything," Ianto protested. Yes, he was definitely starting to sound more American. "I told you, I thought it was broken."

"Well, obviously you were wrong," said Jack, hands splayed on his hips and Welsh vowels flaring.

"Jack?" asked Tosh…but Ianto turned toward her instead. "Er, what's going on?"

"I guess it's not broken after all," said Ianto, grinning wider than any of them had ever seen him grin. Jack stormed over and stood before him with stormy eyes narrowed.

"You think?" he asked, then suddenly seemed to notice the others were all watching. He crossed his arms over his bare chest before running his eyes down Ianto's bare legs. "Jesus, Jack, have some modesty."

Ianto looked down and winked. "Nothing I haven't seen before."

"They haven't," Jack hissed, at which point Owen stepped forward, shaking his head vigorously.

"Please, please tell me this is not what I think it is," he said. Tosh was starting to figure it out, but Gwen was still staring at them in confusion.

"Depends on what you're thinking," said Ianto with a wag of his eyebrows.

"Stop that," said Jack.

"I'm thinking Teaboy doesn't mug like that," replied Owen. He walked slowly, almost hesitantly up to Ianto. "Jack?" he asked, drawing it out.

Ianto sketched a perfect salute, at which Jack rolled his eyes.

"Ianto?" asked Tosh, turning toward Jack.

"It would appear unfortunately so," replied Jack in that dry way that only Ianto could pull off, Welsh accent growing clearer now that it had apparently found its way around Jack's mouth.

"Oh my god," said Gwen. "You've—"

"Gone and done a body swap," finished Owen. "Bloody hell, I hate body swaps."

"Try it from my perspective," said Ianto with a put-upon sigh.

"Been there, done that. At least you're both still men." Owen pointed at them both almost accusingly. "I changed with Suzie a few years back, and that was a nightmare."

"You're not serious?" asked Gwen. "They've actually switched bodies?"

"Have you ever seen me come up to the Hub in my pants with an American accent?" asked Ianto from Jack's body.

"Well, no, but maybe it's some sort of alien drug, extraterrestrial influence…" She trailed off when Jack shook his head vigorously.

"Nope," said Jack, grinning too widely for Ianto's face once more. "Told you I'd seen it before. It's actually called a Soul Swap. Mixolydian, probably 34th century. They'll use it for all sorts of things—psychiatry, punishment, sex—"

"Sex?" asked Ianto, a skeptical look on his face.

"Sure—swapping back and forth while mid-coitus? It's brilliant, although you do have to concentrate on what you're putting where—"

Ianto held up a hand. "Enough. Fix it. I want my body back. Now."

"Why? Don't you like mine?"

"From the outside, yes," replied Ianto. "From the inside, I don't know." A funny look passed over his face and he shifted uncomfortably. "Do you always feel like this?"

"Like what?" asked Jack.

Ianto blushed, proof enough of the swap as Jack  _never_  blushed. "Never mind. Tosh, what happened?"

"I don't know," said Tosh, finally finding her voice. "I was scanning the artifact when it suddenly opened, flared, and went back out."

"Well, let's figure it out how to do it again. I want my body back." Ianto said.

"Live a little, Ianto," replied Jack with another cheeky look. "Walk a mile and all that."

Ianto rolled his eyes. "I like my own shoes just fine, thank you."

"I'll get right on it, see if I can figure out what triggered it and if I can recreate it," said Tosh, and Ianto smiled gratefully at her.

"Thank you. Now, I need to finish cleaning up, especially if this is going to take a while." He turned back toward the office, then threw a raised eyebrow over his shoulder, the smallest hint of a smirk hiding at the tips of his mouth. "Coming?"

"Hell yes," said Jack, dashing after him with a wink at Tosh. Owen groaned and Gwen shook her head.

"I don't know who I feel more sorry for," said Owen. "Teaboy gets Jack's libido, but Jack finally gets to experience what it's like for the poor guy to keep up with it."

"I don't think Ianto has a problem keeping it up," murmured Tosh, and they all looked at one another before bursting into laughter.

When they could finally catch their breath, they started to work on the alien device once more so they could try and reverse whatever had happened to Jack and Ianto.

* * *

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm sure it's been done loads before—it is a sci-fi staple, after all, the body swap—but hopefully this one will be both fun and insightful. And who am I to argue with my muse. At the time, I needed a break from my other stories. More to come shortly, as this was originally published two years ago but needs some good editing. Thanks for reading!


	2. The Retrieval

_Two Hours Earlier…_

They were chasing a rather exotic-looking green alien down an alley. For some reason, aliens always seemed attracted to dark, deserted alleys in Cardiff. Which made cleaning and covering it up easier, but it was usually dirty and smelly and something always went wrong.

Which is exactly what happened this time.

The creature stopped at the end of the alley and turned toward Jack and Ianto, hissing and spitting. Or maybe it was saying something important, but Ianto didn't really care at that moment, he just knew that it needed to be subdued and whatever tech it had somehow followed through the Rift retrieved.

He and Jack both had their weapons trained on the creature. Jack was saying something, though Ianto doubted the thing understood him. As Jack took a step closer, Ianto felt something slam into him from the side, knocking him to the ground hard and leaving him breathless as his gun skidded away. The second creature stood, ignoring him, and raised a strange-looking weapon at Jack.

Ianto saw the alien take aim at Jack and shouted a warning even as he leapt forward and tackled it around the legs, sending them both crashing to the pavement and the alien's gun spinning off into the darkness. The creature was strong, however, and easily rolled them over, crashing Ianto's head to the pavement hard enough that was sure he actually saw stars. He thought he heard Jack's gun go off, but the alien on top of him wrapped a hand around his throat and grinned—at least, Ianto assumed it was a grin as all sorts of teeth appeared—and all thought was lost aside from surviving somehow. Ianto brought his knee up to what he hoped was the creature's groin and kneed it hard. It growled at him, releasing its hold on Ianto's throat just long enough for him to gasp for air. He tried to push it off, but it back-handed him across the temple, slamming him to the ground again, before suddenly falling in a heap on top of him, green blood oozing all over Ianto's suit.

At least it wasn't his favorite one.

Jack was there, pulling it off him and almost violently tossing it to the side. Yet instead of the usual grin of exuberance Ianto expected after a close call during an alien chase, Jack looked positively livid.

"What the hell was that?" he demanded. He didn't help Ianto up, just put his hands on his hips and scowled as Ianto struggled to stand on his own.

"What was what?" Ianto asked, confused. He was covered in a sticky, green mess and his head was throbbing.

"Tackling it like that. You could have been killed."

"It hit me first and knocked my gun away," Ianto replied. He was trying to remain calm even though he was annoyed with Jack, annoyed with another ruined suit, annoyed with the stupid alien bleeding all over the pavement. He stepped over it and found his gun, tucking it behind him before turning around to face Jack. "And if I hadn't tackled it back, you'd probably be dead."

"It wouldn't be the first time," Jack practically growled in response.

"That doesn't make it all right!" Ianto snapped back.

"I can't die. You can."

"That's the third time you've thrown that in my face this week!" exclaimed Ianto, running a hand through his hair only to find it covered with green goo, as well as some of his own blood.

"It's the third time this week you've thrown yourself in front of an alien and almost got yourself killed." Jack shouted back.

Ianto took a deep breath, hoping his voice sounded more steady than he felt. "And it won't be the last time either. It's instinct, Jack. I can't stand by and let something happen to you—to anyone. I won't, and you know that."

"And you know I can take more risks than you, so let me!" Jack retorted, his voice less cold steel and more heated anger.

Ianto turned and threw up his hands, exasperated. "Jesus, Jack! Why do we keep talking about this?"

"We're beyond talking, we're arguing."

Ianto raised an eyebrow to keep from snorting; Jack hated it when he did that, and as much as he might  _want_  to goad Jack right then, Ianto knew it was not the time. "Fine. We're arguing. Why again?"

"Because you keep making the same stupid mistake, Ianto—a mistake that's going to get you killed."

"Stupid mistake? Trying to save someone's life is a stupid mistake now?" Ianto asked, nodding slowly. Something about the look on his face must have told Jack that he had gone too far, because Jack's eyes widened a bit in trepidation. "I'm sorry if doing my job correctly is a stupid mistake,  _sir_." He emphasized the 'sir' and watched Jack flinch with a certain sense of satisfaction.

"Ianto, I—"

"Forget it, Jack. How about I just stick to making coffee and doing the filing? Would that be better?" He bent down next to the sticky green alien and grimaced as he pried the piece of alien tech they'd been after out of its dead hands. It was just a complicated knot of metal as far as he could see. "God knows I wouldn't miss wrangling psychopathic aliens and cleaning up the mess."

There was a long silence as neither one of them said anything; they didn't even look at one another.

"Ianto, I just don't want to lose you." Jack's voice was quiet, almost vulnerable. Ianto stood and sighed, because he  _knew_ that _—_ he understood, he did.

"And I don't want to lose you either, Jack, even if you do come back when I do," Ianto sighed. "I know how much it hurts you to die, and it's painful to watch to suffer. So I can't just—"

He stopped as a large metal rod impaled Jack in the chest, spraying Ianto with more blood, this time red. Jack crumpled almost instantly, a look of grotesque surprise on his face. Behind him stood the first alien, snarling, hissing, and bleeding, and holding out its hand, obviously for the metal knot.

Ianto fell backward in shock, his mind racing. The creature growled again, so Ianto just nodded, stepping back once more to put some distance between him and any more poles the creature might be hiding. He held out his left hand with the knot, while his right hand moved slowly behind him for his gun. The creature hissed and reached for the knot, but at the last moment Ianto tossed it gently to the left, hoping it was as stupid—or desperate— as it looked.

With a lunge the alien went for it, ignoring him completely. Ianto whipped out his gun and without hesitation put three bullets into the creature's head. More green blood spurted everywhere, and Ianto couldn't help but really dread the cleanup on this one.

Hurrying back to Jack, Ianto knelt next to him and swore, knowing instantly it was useless. Jack was dead, and there was nothing Ianto could do but wait for him to revive. He wondered how long it would take Jack to recover from a stab wound through the heart, yet he also knew that if he just sat there and thought about it, waiting for it, he'd go mad replaying their argument over and over.

So he started to clean up the mess. He pocketed the alien knot, retrieved their weapons, and dragged both creatures to the SUV for Owen to have some fun with back at the Hub. He then began cleaning up the blood as best as he could. The whole time, Jack lay against a nearby building, Ianto glancing at him every so often, waiting for that telltale gasp that brought the captain roaring back to life.

Usually Ianto sat with Jack as he revived, but for some reason he was too angry to be there now. He was tired of having the same argument every time Ianto tried to do his job or Jack died doing his. Ianto knew full well it hurt Jack to die and come back to life, and yet he recklessly threw himself in front of danger for them all at every opportunity. And no matter how many times Ianto tried to explain that it hurt  _him_ to watch get Jack injured and die, that Ianto  _had_  to do something if he could, the other man just waved off the argument with a "But I'll come back, you won't" end-of-discussion statement.

It was almost as if Jack didn't understand how it felt to be mortal anymore, and Ianto sure as hell didn't understand Jack's stubborn insistence on continuously testing his immortality. Maybe it was a death wish; maybe Jack wanted to keep dying until he didn't come back. And with that thought, Ianto felt another flush of anger surge through him. He kicked a nearby rubbish bin, swore as his foot began to throb, and let his head fall back, eyes closed against the utter madness that was his life sometimes.

And then he heard the gasp. He took a deep breath and glanced down at Jack.

"Welcome back," he said dryly.

"What the hell happened?" Jack asked, glancing around the alley in confusion. It was as clean as Ianto could get it so of course Jack would be confused: no aliens, no blood, no clue. Ianto crossed his hands over his chest.

"You were impaled. Never seen that before."

Jack pushed himself up the wall and rubbed his chest. "It's not a fun one."

"I can only imagine," said Ianto. Jack narrowed his eyes at him.

"You're still angry at me," he stated.

Ianto shrugged. "You have that affect on people, especially when you die on them. Or for them."

Jack just looked at him a bit apprehensively, then took a shaky step forward. "So did you get it? The one that impaled me? I though I'd shot it."

"I did, and you did," said Ianto, leading the way back toward the SUV parked at the mouth of the alley. "But it came up behind you, and I shot it three times in the head just to be sure this time. Buggers left a bloody mess that I cleaned up as best as I could while you were out. This is what they were after."

He tossed Jack the strange metal knot the creatures had been so desperate for. Jack frowned as he turned it over in his hands, then slowly began to nod.

Ianto got into the driver's seat. "You know what it is?" he asked.

Jack was quiet as he buckled himself in. "I think so. Looks broken, though." He chuckled as he turned it over in his hands.

Ianto pulled away, feeling a bit reckless with his driving and earning a surprised glance from Jack. "What is it then?"

"It's called a EED—an Energy Exchange Device. We just called them Soul Swappers."

Ianto let lose the snort he'd been holding in earlier during their argument. "You mean, it lets people exchange bodies? Like some cliché in a bad science-fiction movie?"

"Ideas have to come from somewhere, even bad ones," Jack shrugged, ignoring Ianto's tone. "But yes—it allows a consciousness to change bodies with another, letting someone experience life from another viewpoint."

"Oh brilliant," said Ianto. "Imagine swapping bodies with Owen. What a nightmare."

Jack grinned. "You could swap with me instead."

That garnered another snort. "That's even better. Then maybe you would know why I do the things I do, like throw myself at rampaging aliens to save someone I happen to—"

"And you might understand why it upsets me so much when you do." Jack interrupted.

"You could see what it's like, watching you lie there covered in blood, waiting for you to gasp back to life," Ianto replied, more sharply than he intended.

"You could  _feel_  what it's like, being dragged back from the darkness time after time," Jack practically spat back. Ianto was silent, and Jack sighed. It had happened again, the same tired argument; sometimes it felt like they were destined to have it forever.

They were quiet the entire ride back to the Hub, which fortunately didn't take that long. Ianto wanted to apologize, but a part of him was still too angry and just as stubborn as Jack. At times like this Ianto wondered how they ever got along, they were so much alike. Ianto would stand by his beliefs, and Jack by his, and they would continue to argue about it, quite possibly until the end of time.

Ianto didn't want to think about that, and simply stopped thinking at all as he pulled into the car park. He left the bodies in the SUV, intending to retrieve them later, or perhaps send Owen after them. They walked stoically into the Hub, each silent and wrapped up in their own thoughts. Ianto knew the team would immediately sense something was wrong, but he didn't really care. Watching Jack's back as he tossed Tosh the alien tech and stormed off to his office just made him angrier. He turned toward the showers, ignoring the palpable tension in the room, wanting nothing more than to clean up and go home.

Less than five minutes later, everything went to shit, and suddenly none of it mattered.

  


 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you for the kudos on the first chapter! I'm sure this has been done before and probably better, but I hope you enjoy my version. This chapter just gives you some background and sets up some more for later on. Back to the fun stuff in the next chapter, hee hee. Oh the challenge of writing Jack-in-Ianto and Ianto-in-Jack. Fun, though. Thanks again and enjoy!


	3. The Shag

Jack followed Ianto into the office and down to the room below. He had just stepped off the ladder when he found a hand wrapped around his waist as Ianto pulled him into a searing kiss that reverberated through every fiber of his being like never before.

"Wow," he said when he stepped back for air. For some reason, it had felt different, and it took Jack a moment to realize why. First of all, he was in Ianto's body, so in a warped kind of way he was actually kissing himself, which was admittedly strange, but it also meant that he was probably experiencing…

"51st century pheromones," Ianto whispered, nipping at Jack's neck. "You people have no idea."

Jack gasped at the sensations flowing through him. It was incredible, so different from when Ianto usually kissed him. While a part of Jack congratulated himself on having such an intense effect on Ianto's body, another part struggled to understand and control the powerful physical feelings aroused within him, so strong and overwhelming yet passionate and wonderful in a glorious way _._

This must be what Ianto felt when they were together. Jack idly wondered how the man had resisted for so long, how he got anything done around the Hub, how he survived some of Jack's more adventurous suggestions…

Ianto was watching him with a knowing smile. With a low growl, Jack gave in, reached down, and began to undo the trousers he usually wore. Ianto kissed him hard and maneuvered them toward the bed.

"You had no idea what you really meant when you said that, did you?" Ianto asked in between kisses. Jack removed the trousers, pants, everything, and literally pushed Ianto onto the bed and straddled him. He leaned down for another long, hard kiss, hands roaming, a groan escaping his lips as Ianto began to unbutton his shirt.

"Not like this," Jack practically panted. Which was true. He'd had sex with men, women, and aliens from across the galaxy, but in his time such pheromones were natural, and so he was used to it; experiencing it from Ianto's point of view, from the body of a 21st century human bowled over by them was completely different. It was so exhilarating it was almost terrifying, and he suddenly had a moment of doubt.

"Wait," he said, pulling back. He felt strangely insecure, as the realization of something he had never considered before began to dawn. "Is this why you slept with me? Why you still sleep with me? Because it feels like this, physically—like you can't resist, can't stop?"

Ianto let his head fall back to the bed and closed his eyes. "No, Jack, that's not why I slept with you. I won't deny I feel it strongly whenever you're near, but it's not like I can't control myself. I'm not some drug addict, coming back for a fix because of the rush."

"It's quite a rush," Jack murmured.

"Yes, it is," said Ianto, and he opened his eyes with a soft smile. "But it's not about the sex, or the rush. It's about you, okay? Now can we please go back to where we were? Surely you remember what it felt like to not get what you wanted in this oversexed body of yours?"

Jack grinned and nodded. "Oh, I remember. And you always wonder how I can be so hard all the time. I told you I literally can't help it."

Ianto reached up and pulled him down for a quick kiss. "I get it now. But Jack…it's not just because I'm here, convenient and willing, is it?"

Jack shook his head as he smiled. "No, it was never about that, not really. I am so thankful that you  _are_  still here and willing, because no matter what you feel in my body right now, I feel more than that, here." And he tapped both of their chests.

Jack almost laughed at the slightly stunned look on Ianto's face…until he realized it was his own face and it suddenly occurred to him what he was about to do with his own body. Ianto gazed back into his eyes, and somehow must have come to the same realization, because he grimaced ruefully and nodded.

"Right. Not the best time for confessions—or lights. I do not want to know what I look like shagging myself." Jack reached for Ianto's arm and the wrist strap that was always there. With a quick punch of a few buttons, all the lights went out, and neither of them had to experience the odd visual of making love to their own body.

"Ready," Jack murmured. Before he could say anything else Ianto had flipped him over, and he forgot all about everything but the man before him.

* * *

Ianto ran a hand down Jack's side, smiling to himself. Torchwood had given him many strange, wonderful, and heartbreaking experiences, but he had never thought he would experience anything like that. Sex with Jack…from Jack's body. He understood now Jack's physical drive, his constant need for closeness, for touch, for sex and release. It was in the man's blood, flowing out through the pheromones Ianto always had such a strong response to but never really understood.

Now he did.

And he suspected Jack understood a bit more about Ianto's perspective, about being so susceptible to those pheromones yet knowing it was more than that, that it was still a choice and that Ianto had chosen to be with  _Jack,_ not just Jack's cock. He wanted to believe Jack when he had said the same thing, and he hoped in turn that Jack believed him.

"We should go back upstairs, see what they've figured out," said Ianto. "It's been over an hour, showers don't take that long." He paused. "Even ours."

Jack was sprawled across him, languid and relaxed and smiling. "I'm sure they have a pretty good idea of what's taking us so long," he said with a wink. He slowly sat up and stretched. "But you're right, we should clean up and see if they've figured out a way to switch us back."

He headed toward the shower, and Ianto followed. "I don't know, I'm starting to get used to this body." Jack turned toward him in surprise, and Ianto was treated to a full frontal view of his own body. "Then again, I don't want to have sex with the lights off for the rest of my life just to avoid seeing myself naked."

"And as beautiful as I may be," Jack said, stepping up to Ianto and kissing him once more, "I like looking at  _your_  body much better than mine in the shower."

"Thanks, Jack," Ianto said as he started the shower. They had a quick snog as they waited for the water to warm up, then a longer shower as Ianto experienced that undeniable urge he now knew Jack felt so much of the time; he also knew that Jack was probably trying to fight it off, but Ianto remembered how strong those pheromones were and how hard it was to resist. He had Jack pressed against the wall of the shower within moments, groaning with pleasure and putting up little resistance.

When they were finally finished cleaning up (it had only been two hours now), they padded back into the main room. Ianto went to Jack's closet and began to pull on some of Jack's clothes, but stopped when he got to the braces. Jack was watching him strangely.

"This doesn't feel right," said Ianto, and Jack nodded.

"Doesn't look right, because I know it's you in there, not me." He narrowed his eyes. "You need a suit, and believe it or not, I do have one."

He pulled out a very out-of-style suit, dark grey with wide pinstripes, narrow lapels, and an even narrower striped tie that almost made Ianto shudder. Jack shrugged apologetically.

"You can take me suit shopping when this is over. I haven't worn it in years."

"Decades, more likely," murmured Ianto.

"No need to," said Jack. "I like my clothes. I can mix and match." He began pulling on trousers and a tee shirt; they were slightly loose on Ianto's frame, but probably more comfortable. Ianto put on the suit and though it was old, it still felt more like  _him,_ and not Jack.

"At least it will help everyone tell us apart," he said. He tried on the skinny tie and snorted. Ripping it from his neck, he tossed it on the bed and left the top button on the light grey dress shirt undone. Jack put on a blue shirt and his braces, and after they pulled on shoes and ran a hand through wet hair, they headed back upstairs. Jack stopped Ianto before leaving the office.

"We'll figure this out," he said softly, a reassuring arm on Ianto's shoulder. Ianto nodded.

"I know. Stranger things have happened."

"Not many," laughed Jack. "But it could be worse. At least it's been fun so far."

"It's definitely been enlightening," agreed Ianto with a small smile, thinking of what Jack had said earlier.

"Maybe if we can get it working normally we can try again," Jack murmured in his ear. "You know, play a few tricks on the team…"

Ianto gave him a pointed look. "That is not why you want it to work, Jack." He narrowed his eyes. "Have you really swapped during sex?"

Jack shook his head. "Nope. Heard it's amazing, though."

Ianto leaned in for a quick but deep kiss. "I don't know if I could get used to kissing my own face, but I'm willing to try if it's that good."

"I knew it, you like being me in bed!" Jack laughed heartily.

Ianto strode away with a wink of his own. "Don't try to tell me you didn't like being me, I heard you. Plus, you could wear my UNIT cap."

Jack pulled him out the door. "Let's go. I definitely want this thing for our private collection."

Ianto laughed with him as he followed Jack back into the Hub. Oddly enough, he wasn't that embarrassed. Stranger things  _had_  happened at Torchwood, but this could prove to be one of the better ones.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> And suddenly my quip in the previous author's note about writing Jack-in-Ianto and Ianto-in-Jack becomes another level of reality. ;)
> 
> This was fun. Tricksy, but fun. Keeping a character in character in another character. Right. Hope it worked and you enjoyed it. Fill in the naughty bits yourself. You know you want to. ;)


	4. The Conference

"What I can't figure out," said Tosh as they all sat in the conference room watching her presentation on the alien device, "is why it switched you and Ianto. You came in and threw it on my desk—why not you and me?"

"You're not missing anything," Ianto murmured, and Jack threw him one of those withering stares Ianto had been so good at in his own body.

"From what I remember," Jack replied, "two people would touch it at the same time to swap bodies with their consciousness."

"Did you and Ianto touch it at the same time then?" she asked. They looked at one another and shook their heads.

"I picked it up first, back in the alley, then tossed it to Jack once he revived," said Ianto. Tosh was still trying to get used to the idea of seeing Jack in a suit. Even though she knew it was really Ianto and that it certainly fit his personality better, Jack's  _body_  just looked so different, albeit in a good (rather 1980s) kind of way.

Ianto sitting at the head of the table in period military dress was even stranger, and she shook her head to concentrate. She'd spent two hours on the device while they had "cleaned up" and had found almost nothing.

"So you did both touch it," she said. "Ianto touched it first, then Jack. I didn't touch it before I started scanning it. So maybe it remembered you somehow when it finally turned on?"

"But what activated it?" asked Jack. "It did nothing the entire way back to the Hub. Why wait so long? Did you notice anything before it turned on? Did you do anything different?"

"She just started scanning it," said Owen, and Tosh nodded in agreement.

"But I didn't pick up anything on the scanner." She shook her head in frustration. "And I didn't pick up anything after it spun around either, or anything since. It's just like you said—it may as well be broken."

"Maybe there's some trick to activating it, or the scanner had some sort of effect," said Ianto. He turned to Jack. "Have you ever actually used it before? Be honest."

"No, I never did," said Jack with a rueful shrug. "Had to study them, stole a few and sold 'em, but I never really wanted to leave my body. I was fond of it. Still am."

He winked and Tosh watched in fascination as Ianto blushed.

"Anyway," said Owen, a look of uncomfortable exasperation on his face. "If it's got some sort of memory for whomever touched it, maybe all you need to do is touch it again to switch back."

"But we've all touched it now, so why haven't we all switched bodies?" asked Gwen. "Not that I want to," she added quickly. "No offense."

"Well, it hasn't gone off again, has it?" asked Owen.

"But Tosh has been running scans constantly," Gwen pointed out. "So maybe that wasn't it."

Tosh was thinking. "I haven't figured out how to activate it, but maybe it has to switch them back before it can move on. Perhaps it remembers the last two people who touched it and won't work until they touch it and swap back again."

"Flesh memory," murmured Ianto. "Brilliant, we're in a bloody Harry Potter novel."

Tosh grinned. "Like the Snitch."

"Which was almost certainly an alien, you know," said Jack, his tone going up in that way it had when he was getting ready to tell a tale. "I once saw something just like it on…"

He trailed off at the looks the team was giving him. "How do you know what a Snitch is?" Gwen asked. Owen snorted.

Ianto sighed. "He borrowed my copy. Kept me up all night asking questions."

There was a slightly stunned silence at the table until Jack finally rolled his eyes. "So I read at night, big deal. Moving on. If the EED has some sort of flesh memory"—Owen snorted again and Gwen giggled— "then like Owen said, maybe all we need to do is recreate what we did before."

Ianto shrugged. "Worth a try. Tosh?"

She was skeptical; nothing had reactivated the device since it had first came on, and she doubted it would work now for no reason other than they wanted to believe it would. Still, it was something, so she nodded.

Both men reached out toward the device and touched it; nothing happened. Tosh ran her scanner over it several times, but it remained still and dark on the table, and Jack and Ianto shook their heads as they sat back.

"So maybe it just doesn't work anymore," said Owen. "Maybe you're stuck like this."

"Please god no," said Ianto as dryly as Tosh had ever heard Jack's voice drop a line; she was fairly certain Ianto was taking the mickey because Jack shot him an immediate frown.

"Hey! That's my body you're talking about."

"I just want my own back," Ianto replied calmly; but he winked at Tosh, and she hid a smile. "Or I'll have to buy you an entire modern wardrobe."

"Funny. Tosh, what if we—"

Jack was interrupted by the Rift alarm going off. Ianto swore vehemently and they all gave him a look of surprise.

"Sorry, Jack's body and all that."

"Your mind, your words, mate," said Owen, and Jack laughed in spite of the seriousness of the situation. Tosh was already checking her PDA.

"Jack, it looks like the aliens are back, we've got two reports of Rift spikes and disturbances nearby." She gave them all a grim look as she read through the reports. "What to you want to bet they're looking for their toy?"

Jack leaned back and frowned as he stared at the metal knot. "But what's so important about it? When I was with the Time Agency, they were available at just about any underground black market if you knew the right planet and had enough money."

"Maybe this one is different," said Ianto. "You said the two people involved had to touch it at the same time, and we clearly didn't need to do that."

"So maybe this is a prototype of some sort?" asked Tosh. "One person touches it, then another, and then when it's activated, they can…" She trailed off at the implication. "But that would mean you could take someone's body without their permission, just by getting them to touch it and then activating it later."

Jack nodded, arms crossed over his chest as he frowned. "Which would be brilliant if you were either dying and wanted a new body, or were a criminal and wanted to escape."

"I bet we've got the latter," muttered Owen. "An alien mob, using it for their witness protection program."

"Maybe it's just broken," said Gwen, obviously trying to stay positive. "Or unfinished. Maybe they need it back so they can get it to work right."

"Or maybe that's how it works: permanently." Ianto didn't look up, and they were all silent as the thought sunk in.

Jack blew out a breath. "I think we have to assume it's dangerous, and that their intentions go a bit beyond having fun with it, given the rather violent reaction we encountered this afternoon and the fact that they've sent more after it. We need to keep this thing secure. If it's a prototype of some kind of weapon and they develop more, they could take over a planet and no one would even know."

"Invasion of the body snatchers," murmured Ianto. "Only without the creepy pods."

The thought was sobering; just two hours before they were laughing about Jack and Ianto swapping bodies and having a bit of fun with it. Now the danger was real, that these aliens could potentially take over people's bodies with such a device.

"All right, where are they?" asked Jack after it sunk in and they all shook themselves of morbid thoughts. "We'll try again after we neutralize them."

"It looks like there's still just the two reports coming in," said Tosh. "One in the city centre and one in Whitchurch."

"All right, Tosh, you stay here and coordinate so you can keep working on that thing some more. Find out how to activate it. I'm going to assume it's not permanent and that it swaps people back like it's supposed to, and I want to be ready to try when we're done with these things. Security Lockdown 3 just in case more show up looking for it. Gwen, Owen, you go out to Whitchurch. Ianto and I will head out to the city centre so we can be closer to the Hub in case something goes wrong." He paused and took a breath. "The aliens we encountered earlier were vicious and messy. Shoot to kill, because they can pop right back up if you don't do it right the first time. And they have no issues with sticking things right through your gut."

Everyone stood, but Owen held back, frowning as he tapped a pen on the table.

"Owen, something wrong?" asked Jack, impatient curiosity written across his face.

"Well it's just that you two—"he pointed to Jack and Ianto—"are compromised, aren't you? You're operating from inside a body you're not familiar with, under stressful circumstances that could put you at risk in the field."

Jack glanced at Ianto and frowned. "Owen, we can't just stand down. We need to stop these things, and then we'll switch back." He shrugged. "Besides, I'm getting used to it." Ianto nodded in agreement.

Owen stood, still upset about something. He waved the girls off and came to stand very close to Jack and Ianto.

"Look, I hate to be the one pointing this out, but your positions are reversed now. Your  _mortality_  is reversed. Jack's body can't die, but Jack—" he turned to Ianto's body—"you can now. Don't go getting teaboy's arse killed, because you'll probably go with it and leave him stuck with your little problem of forever."

"Shit," said Jack, staring at Ianto. "I didn't think of that."

Ianto gave him a funny look. "So now I'm the one who can't die saving the world, and you're the one who will have to be sure you don't make any stupid mistakes."

Jack's eyes hardened. "That's easier said than done, Ianto. I'm not just going to let you sacrifice yourself if I can help it."

"Funny, I remember saying the same thing a few hours ago," Ianto replied as they stared at one another. Owen took a step back; now he knew what they had been arguing about when they first came in.

"But that was different, you were mortal then!" said Jack.

"And now you are," replied Ianto evenly. He stepped forward as if he wanted to be closer to Jack, but merely offered a small smile instead of reaching out. "Please don't muck up my body too much. I want it back when this is finished."

Jack closed the distance between them and pulled Ianto into a searing kiss. Owen fled, although he glanced over his shoulder before he left. Leaning his forehead against Ianto, Jack whispered, "Please don't get yourself killed. I don't want you to experience what that's like."

Ianto nodded, though his voice came out hoarse. "I'll try if you try. Now, are you ready?"

"Let's go," said Jack. "We need to tell these things to stay the hell away from our planet with their toys."

  


 


	5. The Chase

Jack and Ianto took Ianto's car to the city centre. It was not far from where they had killed the first two aliens and found the device that was apparently so popular. At first the silence in the car was tense, given how they had left things in the conference room, until Jack finally glanced at Ianto and offered him a smile.  


"It'll be fine," he said, reaching out and touching Ianto's leg, more for his own sake than Ianto's. Ianto glanced sideways and nodded tightly. "You don't believe me."

"I believe you," said Ianto, whipping the car through light traffic. "It's not going to be easy, though."

Jack was silent for a moment. "Why not?"

Ianto waited an equally long time to reply. "Because you're not the big damn hero right now, Jack. You can't go rushing in with nothing but reckless bravado backing you up."

"I've got you to back me up." Ianto rolled his eyes. "Fine, I get it. I'll be careful, since apparently you're fond of your body and have no wish to keep mine."

"It's not about my body—I don't want to lose  _you_ , Jack," Ianto snapped, which caused Jack to, of all things, snort. Because he got it, and now Ianto did as well.

"That sure sounds familiar. We're getting good at throwing our words back and forth at each other, aren't we?"

Ianto glanced over again and gave him a crooked smile. "I guess so. Maybe once this is over we should market that thing for psychotherapy."

Jack burst out laughing, Ianto's deep voice booming from his chest. "Gives all new meaning to the term role play, that's for sure."

"Walk a mile, you said," Ianto pointed out. He pulled into a parking space at the shopping center Tosh had indicated and practically jumped out of the car. "Well, here's our chance. Let's do it right. Don't die."

"Same to you."

As usual, things didn't always go as planned in Torchwood.

The alien they encountered was nothing like the green creatures they had originally given chase to hours earlier. This one was vaguely humanoid, but short and blue, with a furry face that looked more like a cat than anything. It demanded the device in stilted English peppered with strange clicks and pops, but Ianto put it down with the stun gun before it could finish its grand speech. When Jack asked him why he shot it so quickly, Ianto shrugged; it was cute but annoying, he said. Jack suspected that Ianto was proactively trying to stop Jack from doing anything reckless.

They tossed the alien in the back of the car, Ianto complaining the entire time about having it detailed to remove the hair. As soon as Jack stepped into the car, he started sneezing.

"You're allergic to cats?" he asked incredulously. He could actually feel his sinuses swelling, which was unusual because he so rarely got sick, and when he did, he usually felt better within hours. Now he suddenly realized he would have to endure whatever physical ailments Ianto normally suffered. Fortunately, Ianto gave him a look of sympathy and didn't rub it in too much.

"Not that bad, but apparently this alien is worse than your normal earth-born cat. Strange. I feel fine." He pulled out as Jack grumbled under his breath.

The com came on then. "Jack? Ianto? There's another sighting not far from you. Owen and Gwen are still running down theirs, can you get to it?"

"Of course, Tosh," Ianto answered as Jack let out a massive sneeze. He opened the windows and turned on the air conditioning, hoping it would help blow some of the alien hair away. "Send the location to Jack's mobile." Jack sneezed three times in a row and swore.

"What was that?" asked Tosh. Jack spoke up, his voice even lower as his nose was completely stuffed up now.

"Ianto has allergies. Did you know he's allergic to cats? And that we just caught a furry blue cat trying to track down our little toy?"

"A cat?" asked Tosh, ignoring Jack's miserable sniffling. "You mean, there's something else looking for it?"

"Apparently. Maybe the green aliens stole it," suggested Ianto. Jack held up his mobile, Ianto saw the location, and sped off toward the Bay and whatever alien might be next.

"Hang on, let me check with Gwen and Owen." There was silence on the line as Jack continued to sneeze, although it was getting better with the windows open. When Tosh came back, she sounded worried.

"Jack, Owen says their target isn't a green alien either. They're after a Blowfish. What's going on?"

Jack gave Ianto a worried glance as he tried to think through the fog in his brain. He really missed his instant healing abilities and wondered if they should stop at a Tescos for tissues and some allergy medication.

"I don't know yet, Tosh, but I'm thinking maybe it's a hot commodity out there," he answered between sniffles. "And that we've got ourselves a pack of bounty hunters looking for it. Let Gwen and Owen know."

Ianto whistled under his breath. "Bounty hunters. That's another new one."

"What, bounty hunters?" asked Jack. "Nah, we've seen 'em before." He paused. "Well, I have. Used to be quite popular with them, actually."

"In what way?" asked Ianto, turning sharply onto the A470 to get to Britannia Park.

"The usual," said Jack, letting the wind wash over him through the open window.

"Sex then?" replied Ianto, and Jack gave him a hurt look.

"No…not really…well, yes, but more buying, selling, stealing—that sort of thing." He turned back to Ianto. "I had quite the career after I quit the Time Agency."

"I can only imagine," Ianto murmured dryly.

"Yeah, well imagine your worst." Jack paused to wink, though it made his eyes itch. "And I probably did it."

Ianto grinned at him. "Remind me not to play Never Have I Ever with you."

"But it would be brilliant," Jack said, combining a laugh with another sneeze. "You'd be so soused you'd never remember anything I said afterward."

"I'd record it," Ianto replied.

"I'd delete it," Jack tossed back.

"And I'd get Tosh to recover it," Ianto finished. "With promises of coffee and pastries for life." He glanced sideways at Jack. "So when are we playing? I'd like to know what not waking up with a hangover is like."

Jack sighed. "It's brilliant. As is the lack of allergies." He punctuated it with another sneeze. "Do we have anything in the SUV for this? It's ridiculous."

"Call Owen," replied Ianto. "He'd know better what's in the med kit."

Jack didn't bother. They were almost at their destination, and he checked in with Tosh again on the com as they approached. "Where exactly should we go?" he asked.

"I picked up something toward the southern tip of the park, not far from the memorial," she replied. "Be careful."

Ianto turned off the headlights of the SUV and pulled over. "On foot, then?" he asked, and Jack nodded.

"Anything to get out of this car."

They made their way carefully toward the memorial, torches out and guns ready. Yet when they reached the memorial, Jack almost dropped them both.

Sitting there in the grass was a Chula space fighter, though the woman lounging against it reading her scanner was most definitely not from Chula.

"Jack Harkness," she said, glancing up and striding forward. "You are an idiot." And she kissed Ianto hard, while Jack just stood there, stunned speechless, and watched.

* * *

Ianto was a bit too shocked to respond at first; the ship was, perhaps, not that unexpected, but the beautiful woman who flew it was. She was dressed in a skin tight flightsuit, with long dark hair and flashing blue eyes and full red lips and—-well, when she called Jack an idiot and kissed Ianto, what was he supposed to do? Push her away? His brain might think so, but his body certainly didn't.

Jack coughed, and Ianto disentangled himself from the woman's lips, too late hoping that she wasn't a nutter like John Hart and wearing paralyzing lip gloss. His hand flew to his face to check for numbness, and she laughed.

"If I had been wearing any, you'd be dead and you know it," she said. She turned toward Jack and raised an eyebrow. "Who's the guy in the coat? I like it."

Jack finally grinned, and Ianto could see him winding up. "Thanks. And actually, I'm—"

"Ianto Jones," Ianto stepped in. "My coworker. Assistant. Employee, if you will."

The mysterious woman turned back to Ianto and grinned. "I'd heard you had settled down, turned all respectable." She fingered his lapels and Ianto felt a rush through his body at her touch; he wasn't sure whether it was because of her or if Jack always felt like that when someone touched him, but bloody hell, she was sexy…

"You've even picked up the accent and started dressing like a native," she murmured. Once more she stepped closer, ghosting her lips across his ear. And then without warning she kneed him hard in the groin, so that Ianto doubled over with a moan, clutching himself as Jack winced.

"You're still an idiot, though. What the hell were you thinking, getting mixed up in this?"

Jack stepped forward while Ianto tried gingerly to stand straight. "That's the thing, Tahlia," he said, trying to offer her another winning grin. "We're not quite sure what we're mixed up in. Care to tell us what's going on?"

She looked at him suspiciously. "How do you know my name?" she asked. Ianto shook his head frantically, knowing Jack was going to tell her the truth, but if this woman had it out for him, then Ianto would rather have her thinking Jack was actually in Jack's body, Welsh accent, suit, and all.

Jack raised his eyebrows and stepped closer, and with a surreal sense of unreality, Ianto watched as Jack tried to charm her from Ianto's body. Tahlia just looked confused, and Jack, probably used to the instant effect of his pheromones, almost seemed to deflate when she didn't swoon at his feet. Ianto snorted as he finally managed to stand up straight.

"We may not know what we're mixed up in," he said as Jack floundered a bit more, "but we know from experience that it's important."

"From experience?" she replied, then glanced back over at Ianto, who gave her a tiny shrug and rueful smile. "Oh no." She whipped back to Jack. "You don't mean you used it? Jack, is that you in there?"

Jack nodded. "Yep. Swapped bodies several hours ago and have been trying to figure out how to get back—and get rid of the sudden influx of bounty hunters—ever since."

Tahlia narrowed her eyes at Jack before turning back to Ianto. "So who are you then?"

Ianto inclined his head. "Ianto Jones, the coworker-slash-assistant-slash-employee."

She stared at him, studying him as if she could read the truth in his face, and Ianto felt his body start to respond again, saw Jack narrow his eyes at them. Finally Tahlia grinned. "Tahlia Blake. And you're a good kisser, Ianto Jones," she whispered with a wink, then stepped back and eyed both of them, arms crossed against her chest.

"So what do you know?" she asked.

"Not enough," Jack admitted. "But starting with why you're here would be good. Is the Time Agency involved?"

Tahlia frowned. "The Time Agency? Of course not. There's only twelve of us left now."

"John said there were seven," Ianto murmured, though he knew full well John Hart was a lying bastard. Tahlia shrugged.

"Who knows when he came from? Maybe there are only seven now. For the record, I am not one of them." She gestured at the ship. "I'm a freelancer."

"You mean, a bounty hunter," said Jack, and he frowned at the ship. "What the hell are you doing as a bounty hunter?"

"Making more money than you ever did running cons," she replied with a sassy lilt to her voice that Ianto rather liked; it seemed to put Jack in his place. "I'm good at finding things," she shrugged in reply to Jack's raised eyebrow. "And the Time Agency…well, you know. You left too."

"I know," Jack said softly. "So are you after the device?"

"The EED?" she asked, and they nodded. "I am, though not for the reasons you might think." She stepped closer to them, seeming to favor Ianto, which he found nice for a change, even if it was because he was in Jack's body. "Do you know what it does?"

"It obviously swaps souls," said Jack, stepping closer to Ianto. "Only we're not sure how it works. It's different than the ones I used to lift and hock."

She nodded. "It's a prototype of a weapon." Jack and Ianto exchanged glances; they had been right then. She noticed the look and continued. "You've apparently already figured out it doesn't need to be touched by both parties at the same time."

"Yes, we noticed," said Jack dryly.

"So it's more of a body snatcher than a soul swapper," said Ianto, and she smiled at him.

"I like that voice coming from Jack's body. And smart words too—you haven't said a single dirty thing yet, Ianto Jones."

He flashed her a bit of Jack's trademark grin, which made Jack frown and step even closer, as if trying to keep an eye on things.

"Anyway," she continued, shaking her head. "That's exactly what it does, which makes it the perfect weapon for taking over a planet. Take over the government first, and if needed, the civil servants, and soon the entire planet is under your control, even though the people think it's still the same government."

"It's brilliant, but a bit mad," Ianto said, and she agreed.

"It's horrifying. And Jack," she glanced at Jack, frowning, "it's permanent. There's no swapping back."

"Shit," said Jack, blowing out a breath. "We were afraid of that. Hell of a weapon, then."

"That's why there are so many bounty hunters after it," she said, giving them both a sympathetic look. "It's a dangerous weapon in any hands, but it's also a bit of an abomination, don't you think? Something that just lets you permanently steal someone's body?"

"Who are you working for?" Jack asked, and she hesitated.

"No one," she finally replied, and didn't look at him. She looked at Ianto instead. "I'm on my own. I want to hand it over to the Shadow Proclamation."

Ianto nodded; he'd heard of the Shadow Proclamation, of course, but it was not something he was qualified to comment on. Tahlia seemed to be seeking some sort of approval from him, which he felt he should give, if only to encourage her not to kick him again.

"I think that'd be for the best, although…" He glanced at Jack, who was worrying at his thumb.

"We need to switch back," Jack said. "We're not giving it up until we switch back."

"So you do have it?" she said, and there was a calculated look in her eyes. Ianto was worried they'd given up the game, but Jack knew how to play…usually.

"We do," he replied, then rolled his eyes. "Obviously. And I'll hand it over if you make a deal."

"I could just take it," Tahlia replied. "You're out of your time, Jack. You're not even in your own body. My weapons are far more advanced than yours, I could just take it and leave."

"You don't know where it is and no, you couldn't just take it. My people are good." He paused and stepped closer to her. "Plus you don't want to do that. You were always the one with a conscience. That's why you're here."

She seemed to struggle with her reply, until she finally nodded and turned to Ianto. "He's still insufferable, isn't he?" she asked, and Ianto nodded in perfect agreement.

"Always has been, always will be." She smiled at him.

"I like this," she said, running a hand down Ianto's arm. "You look like him but you sound so much nicer."

Jack stepped between them. "And he's just as good in bed. So back off."

Ianto stared at him wide-eyed, exchanged a look with Tahlia, and burst out laughing. She quickly joined him, and oh yes, he decided he definitely liked her. It wasn't often Jack reared his jealous side.

"Anyway," said Jack, practically growling at the two of them. "What do you say?"

"What's the deal?" she asked.

"Help us switch back," he said simply. "And we'll give it you."

Tahlia sighed. "Jack, I told you—it's permanent. There's no way to switch back."

"There has to be," Jack insisted. "I'm not letting Ianto stay in my body, not when it's—" He stopped himself, and Ianto could see Jack was visibly upset. "Not when it's forever," he finished softly, eyes finding Ianto with a look of deep sadness in them.

Ianto swallowed a lump in his throat. Jack didn't care that he might finally be rid of his immortality; he only worried about Ianto, knowing from experience how hard it was to live on and watch everyone around him die. Ianto was worried about it too, but he also wasn't ready to give up.

"That's a nice ship you've got there," he said, nodding to the fighter behind her. She narrowed her eyes at him.

"If you were really Jack, you wouldn't actually be talking about my ship," she said, and Ianto just smiled. She was quick.

"I'm not Jack, I'm just a poor Welshman who has to deal with him every day."

She cocked an eyebrow. "My sympathies," she said, very seriously. Ianto ducked his head in response.

"My thanks." Looking up, he met her blue eyes and again felt that rush of desire; he shook it off to concentrate. "Now, we have good people, like Jack said. Can you get us another device—one of the originals, one that does the original type of swap? Because I'm pretty sure we can figure out a way to make one or the other work to switch us back."

She nodded slowly. "You want an original so you can see how it works and fix the prototype?"

"Yes." Beside him, Jack was nodding his approval.

"Good idea. Tosh could do it." He gave Tahlia a questioning look. "Bring us another and as soon as we're back, we'll hand it over."

She pursured her lips and shook her head. "I'm still not sure why I should help you," she said.

Ianto stepped forward, took her face in his hands, and kissed her—long and hard. It was instinct—physical instinct, pure and simple. It was why so many things about Jack had never really bothered him, because deep down Ianto knew Jack was different: he was from another time, another place, another set of rules dictating human contact and sexuality.

It was extremely liberating to actually feel it and to know that he had been right.

It was also rather nice knowing that for once Jack was the one standing there watching, rolling his eyes, and waiting. When Ianto finally pulled back, Tahlia was slightly breathless.

"You'll help us because you're a good person," he said softly. "It's why you came here, after all, right?"

She just stared into his eyes, and Ianto stepped back and coughed to try and break the spell. It had been a hell of a kiss but frankly, he couldn't wait to get back to the Hub and push Jack against the nearest wall. He idly let his arm wind around Jack and found his arse, holding tight in anticipation.

"I don't think I like you after all," she said, although she clearly didn't mean it, and Ianto grinned along with Jack. "Having this Ianto Jones in your body, Jack, is even more dangerous than you in your body."

"Hey," said Jack. "I'm the original. He's just using my body for sex." Ianto rolled his eyes at the many meanings behind that simple statement. Tahlia's mouth fell open a bit before she finally shook her head.

"You two are messed up," she murmured.

Jack stepped forward and took her hand. "At the moment, yes. But Ianto is right. You are a good person. You were always too good for the Time Agency, none of us knew how you managed it with an actual conscience."

Tahlia shrugged, apparently self-conscious. "It had its moments. And I liked being the conscience. I think I stopped a few bad things from happening in my time with them. I hope I did, anyway."

"Help us with this one then," Jack said, almost pleading. "Find us another so we can fix this. You can take it to the Shadow Proclamation, and it'll be all over. Please."

She was silent for a moment, glancing back and forth between them. "Oh fine," she finally said. "It's not like I can say no—to either of you." She turned back to her spacecraft. "I'll head to the Ventinian Bazaar. They usually have some hiding in the back rooms."

Jack nodded. "I sold a few there," he replied, an almost wistful look coming over his face. "Ventin was an interesting place."

"And expensive. It'll cost you, Jack. Do you have money?"

"We've got money," Ianto answered. He was the general support, after all; he'd find it somewhere and pay her somehow.

She smiled at him before climbing into her ship. "Good. I'll be back in a week. Have it ready, hold off the others, and try not to get into more trouble." She paused. "And maybe put on the silk sheets. I never got that threesome you promised, Jack."

With a quick wink, she slammed the door shut. Jack pulled Ianto back, and Ianto watched in amazement as the fighter lifted into the sky and flew away. He sighed.

"We'd better have Tosh get on this. A ship like that will take some explaining."

Jack was staring at the stars. "Yeah." He sounded wistful again, and Ianto took his hand. He immediately felt that rush of hormones and adrenaline and closed his eyes against it. How did Jack manage to think straight sometimes? No wonder he was so eager, so adventurous; he literally couldn't help it.

Ianto squeezed Jack's hand, both to comfort him and to get him moving, because there was no way they'd make it back to the Hub in time. Jack smiled at him as they walked toward the SUV.

Which was where they had a quick, hot shag against the boot before finally heading back to the Hub to see what other visitors had come looking for their toy.


	6. The Week - Ianto

It was a long week.

After several violent and exceptionally messy encounters with a variety of aliens searching for the soul swapping device, things finally quieted down. Perhaps word had got out that Torchwood was holding onto it for dear life, or perhaps an organized attack was about to rain down on them and rip it from their cold, dead hands.

Either way, for two entire days the Hub had a relative reprieve while they waited impatiently for Tahlia Blake to return with a second device. Gwen stayed in touch with the local police, trying to track down any leads before they blew up into something bigger. Owen examined the aliens they had unfortunately been forced to kill in defense, while Tosh continued to work on the EED device, always making sure to lock it up afterwards. She also examined any tech the aliens left behind, careful to not cause another disaster like the one that had left Jack and Ianto trapped within the wrong bodies.

Then again, they seemed to be making the most of it.

When they weren't drinking coffee, doing paperwork, or archiving, they took care of any Weevil sightings, usually with great enthusiasm. Their excitement for the hunt only increased as they continued to return to the Hub each time with nothing more than bumps and bruises. Ianto's healed quickly, while Jack grumbled about his. Ianto murmured things in his ear no one wanted to know, especially when they disappeared for hours at a time, only to reappear with self-satisfied grins as they exchanged looks they thought no one noticed.

Everyone noticed.

Ianto knew they had been lucky that neither of them had suffered any serious injuries—or death. Of course, that could all change once the bounty hunters decided they'd had enough of a break and returned in force, but hopefully Tahlia would return with another device so that Tosh could work out a way to switch them back.

The first sign of things returning to normal was a nasty Hoix that Gwen and Owen went after in Blackweir Woods. It took more effort than a usual Hoix as this one was exceptionally determined to have its prize, leaving Gwen with a goose-egg of a knot on the back of her head and Owen with an equally painful cut across his forearm that he was forced to stitch up himself.

Jack and Ianto went after the next alien to show up, a brutal-looking snarling thing that hardly appeared intelligent enough to speak, yet alone articulate in a well-cultured English accent its demands for the stolen property of the Most High and Exalted Chieftain of Mixolydian Moon Alpha-Beta-Gamma.

Ianto looked at Jack and rolled his eyes. Jack's eyes in turn went wide, and he shook his head frantically as the creature apparently took offense, lowering its head with a growl, and before Ianto knew it, his throat had been ripped open and he fell to the ground, blood gushing everywhere in a fountain of crimson.

So much blood. There went the new suit he'd bought for Jack.

Jack shot the creature through each eye before kneeling next to Ianto, his face terrified and furious. Ianto wanted to ask what the hell had just happened, but he couldn't talk…couldn't breathe, really. He was choking on his own blood. He felt panic rush through him and reached out for Jack, his eyes wide and heart racing.

Jack's face smoothed into a mixture of sympathy and sadness; Ianto thought maybe there were tears in Jack's eyes. Were they for him? Did that mean he was dying?

"Just relax," Jack said softly, his voice cracking as he held Ianto's hand and wiped some blood away from his mouth. "Breath as best as you can, slowly through your nose, so you don't hyperventilate while it happens."

_While what happens?_  Ianto wanted to scream, and he shook his head, unable to speak. Jack grabbed his face to still him, staring into his eyes intently. "Ianto, I didn't want you to go through this, but it's too late. Don't fight it. Close your eyes, I'll be right here until you come back."

Ianto was sure Jack's voice was shaking, and before he closed his eyes, he was certain he saw tears on the face above him.

"I'm sorry," he tried to say, but his ruined throat could not form the words. He was scared, but he closed his eyes and did as Jack said, trying to relax into it to so that it did not hurt as much. Logically, he knew that he should come back from whatever he would find in the afterlife because he was in Jack's body, yet emotionally he was not prepared, because what if he didn't? He'd always suspected he'd die young, but he'd hoped for a few more years, and he'd never had the option of coming back; the thought of _not_ coming back when he now believed he could made death that much worse to contemplate.

His limbs were heavy, his breathing shallow. Sound faded into silence and the dim light through his eyelids turned to darkness. He literally felt his heart slow down one beat at a time until it stopped, his last bit of life spilling out from the hole in his throat, and he knew then that he was gone.

Dead.

It was just as Jack had once said it was: nothing but darkness. Emptiness. Coldness. Ianto wasn't sure if he had any sort of ethereal body, or if it was simply his formless consciousness trying to understand everything in human terms. And yet as he waited, trying to process this strange, empty nothingness, he noticed a light somewhere nearby. It radiated a soft glow, gentle and inviting.

He tried to move toward it, but did not feel any movement forward, nor did the light appear any closer. He wondered if the light was the true barrier between life and death, the inviting tunnel so many near-death experiences seemed to include. He assumed he couldn't move toward it because he was tied to Jack's body and his strange immortality.

He hoped so. He wasn't ready to leave Jack yet.

Ianto idly wondered if that was how Jack felt every time he died: if he wanted to go back to the world of the living because he wasn't ready to leave, or if he had died so many deaths that he was weary, longing for the light. Ianto suspected it was a bit of both; that Jack had strong ties to Torchwood now, but that the thought of outliving them was often something he couldn't bear much longer. Ianto thought he understood a bit more of the enigma that was Jack.

He contemplated an eternity of dying a painful death only to end up in this dark, empty place, teased by the light but never able to touch it, feel it, move through it and let it envelop him. A part of him longed to know what was in the light, on the other side, because knowing there was nothing but darkness so far was hardly encouraging when it came to facing death bravely. He felt cheated, in a way, that all there was to life was cold nothingness afterward. There had to be more behind the light; it didn't seem fair, otherwise.

But then, not much about life (and death) was fair, especially for Torchwood.

With a very tangible jerk somewhere around his navel, Ianto felt his consciousness pulled back away from the light, toward something frightening…toward pain. He felt like he was being raked over hot coals and shattered ice at the same time. He was tumbling over sharp rocks and broken glass, a never ending spiral of screams and gasps and  _oh_   _god_  the pain. He spun and fell and twisted until with a devastating collision of mind and body that took his breath away, he was back, eyes flying open with a gasp.

Jack was there, holding him.

There was still blood everywhere. Ianto could taste it in his mouth and feel it on his body. Yet when he reached up toward his throat, he found it whole, unopened; he had returned from the dead, just like Jack, blood running through his veins once more and not just down his neck.

"How long?" he rasped out, relieved to be able to speak again. Jack was holding him so tight Ianto thought he might pass out from it, and he manuevered his way up and around to face Jack. The look on Jack's face almost killed him again, and that was when Ianto truly understood why Jack had been so angry with him for risking his life when they had first found the soul swapping device. Ianto wouldn't come back from the kind of serious injury that ripped a man's throat out, had he been in his own body. He'd be well and truly dead. Forever.

"Oh god, Jack," he whispered, taking Jack's face in his own, not caring about the blood everywhere. "I'm sorry." He kissed him gently, but Jack returned the kiss with desperate passion, almost growling as he pulled back to wipe away his tears.

"Don't ever do that again," he said, managing to sound both stern and scared.

"Believe me, I don't want to," Ianto murmured. He glanced around at the unbelievable amount of blood coalescing around him. "At the very least, it's too much of a mess to clean up."

And with that, Jack laughed, once more pulling Ianto close, and Ianto let himself be held, he was so relieved to be back in Jack's arms and alive.

"How long was I out?" he finally asked again. Jack pulled away and stood, helping Ianto up and supporting him when he stumbled, woozy from blood loss; he wondered how long it would take to replenish all that he had lost. Jack gazed down and sighed.

"Half an hour," he finally said softly, then met Ianto's eyes. "It felt like forever."

Ianto nodded. "I know it does," he said.

"I know you do," Jack replied. He helped Ianto toward the SUV. "And now I do. It was awful."

He opened the passenger door for Ianto, who insisted on putting down a plastic tarp first. Once that was finished, he fell into the car and leaned back, eyes closed as he let his body heal. Jack squeezed his hand.

"I'll get the short-tempered alien and clean up as much as I can. You rest. I'll just be a few minutes."

Ianto thought he might fall asleep, he was so exhausted, and yet his mind was racing so fast that he couldn't sleep, not yet. Jack might finally understand what it was like for Ianto to watch him die, to sit with him until he gasped back to life, but more than that, Ianto understood how it felt for Jack to die: the pain of death itself, the longing to both stay and return, the excruciating pull back into his body with one great gasp of life that was both disappointing and exhilarating.

And Jack endured it, each and every time. How many times had he died and returned? How many times had he died and returned alone? How did he not go insane?

How could the universe do this to one man?

When Jack returned and started the SUV, Ianto didn't know what to say. Jack gave him a small smile that Ianto simply returned without words. As they pulled away, Ianto swallowed (it felt good to swallow again and not choke) and tried to finally articulate something of his thoughts.

"Jack, I—"

"It's all right," Jack said softly, staring straight ahead. "You don't have to say anything."

"I want to," Ianto replied. "How can I not?"

"Because I don't want you to," Jack said, and this time when he glanced at Ianto, his eyes were heartbroken and pleading. "Please, Ianto. I never wanted you to experience that. It…it shouldn't have happened. I'm sorry."

"Jack, it's not your fault!" Ianto exclaimed. "And if you don't want to talk about it, that's…that's all right. I get it."

"Thank you," said Jack, heading back toward the Hub. Ianto reached for his hand and held it tight as they drove.

"But I understand now," he said softly. "Everything." And he did, for in one devastating instant, it had all become clear—what Jack lived for, what he died for, what he had left for, what he always came back for. Ianto understood.

"I know," Jack replied, his voice breaking. "And I'm still sorry."

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I suppose I could combine this with the next part, Jack's POV, but I think it needs to stand on it's own. It was a pretty powerful experience for Ianto, and I hope that came across. I would love to know what you thought if you have any comments! Thank you for reading and leaving so many kudos!


	7. The Week - Jack

They returned to the Hub in silence. Jack left the body of the alien bounty hunter in the SUV, intending to send Owen out for it later. Right now he just needed to clean up and get the horrible image of Ianto bleeding out and dying in his arms from his mind, preferably with a very stiff glass of scotch.

Tosh gasped when she saw them both covered in blood, but Ianto just waved her away as he headed wearily toward the showers alone. Jack watched him go then closed his eyes with a deep sigh until he felt a gentle hand on his arm.

"He died, didn't he?" Tosh asked softly, and when Jack nodded tiredly, she took his hand and led him to his office, shutting the door behind them. "Want to talk or clean up first?"

"There's not much to say," Jack muttered. He tumbled onto the sofa and let his head fall into his hands. "It was the most horrible thing I've ever experienced, Tosh. And I've lost a lot of people, watched many of them die terrible deaths. This was the worst."

Tosh poured him a drink, as if she knew that was what he needed. She had been with him the longest, after all, and they had toasted many missions—both the good and the bad—together. "Why?" she asked as she handed him a glass of scotch. She sat down next to him without pouring herself a drink, just offering her comforting presence.

"Because even though I knew he would come back, a part of me didn't want him to if it meant experiencing what I go through every time." He took a long pull of the scotch and gave her a crooked grin. "It's not pleasant." It was an understatement, but he didn't want to pull Tosh into the horrible truth of it; bad enough that Ianto knew now.

"I can't imagine," Tosh murmured. She watched him with sad eyes until she finally spoke again. "He's strong, though. You know that."

"I know," said Jack. "Stronger than me, I think. Because now I know what it's like to be on the other side—to watch, to wait, to worry." He took another drink. "To be terrified he won't come back…and I don't think I could do it again."

"So now you know," Tosh agreed. "But don't let it change anything."

"Like what?" he asked, frowning.

"How you act, how you react." There was a pause. "How you feel." He glanced up at her; was it that obvious?

"Ianto has a choice, Jack, he always has," Tosh said softly. "He chose to join Torchwood, he chose to come back. He chose to stay, and he chose to care…about what we do, about us, about  _you_. Don't take that away from him. He wouldn't forgive you for taking away his choices."

"I wasn't thinking—" Jack started, but Tosh gave him that sweet, sad smile of hers that meant she  _got_  it, even if he didn't.

"Maybe not," she said. "But a gentle reminder doesn't hurt. Did he talk about it much on the way back?"

"I wouldn't let him," Jack whispered, hanging his head again. Tosh patted his knee and stood.

"Then I'll go check on him while you get cleaned up," she replied. "Take your time. Gwen and Owen are out—Andy called about something strange, but I'm not sure it's related. It could just be Weevils."

She turned to leave, and Jack finished his drink. Whether it was the scotch or Tosh, he did feel slightly better, if a bit guilty for not allowing Ianto to talk about it in the car. He'd make up for it. He had no choice. If Ianto could deal with it, so could he.

"Thanks, Tosh," he called after her, and she nodded in response before leaving. He went down to his room and peeled off his ruined clothes, soaked through with so much blood. It had dried and stuck to his skin, and with a deep sense of revulsion, Jack stepped into the shower and stood there for as long as he could, letting the hot water pound away everything that had happened. He wanted his own body back; he didn't want Ianto to have to go through that again. Ever.

Dressing slowly—if he admitted it to himself, he dreaded going upstairs and facing Ianto—Jack finally realized he could stall no longer and made his way up the ladder to his office. Ianto was sitting on the sofa, swirling his own glass of scotch in his hands. He glanced up when Jack entered and cocked an eyebrow.

"I see you already had a glass," he said, indicating the empty tumbler on Jack's desk.

"I could do with another," Jack replied, moving forward, but Ianto shook his head.

"Better not. Scotch goes to my head much quicker than yours. Should keep it clear in case something else comes up."

"We can send the others," Jack said, but he didn't pour another drink. He sat down on the other side of the sofa, because he wasn't sure if Ianto wanted him close yet.

"They're still out," Ianto said, sitting back wearily. "So it'll be us if anything comes knocking again."

"Then I hope nothing does," said Jack.

"Me too."

There was a long silence as Ianto sipped at his drink, and Jack just watched him. He was wearing casual clothes given his suit had just been ruined, and he looked fairly normal, if a bit pale and peaky. Jack knew from experience what traumatic blood loss was like to recover from, but he was more worried about Ianto's mental health.

"How are you feeling?" he finally asked, even though he knew the answer.

"Tired," said Ianto. "And like I could really go for a large steak about now."

Jack laughed.  "It's the blood loss," he said. "You're craving iron. Leafy green vegetables are healthier."

"They don't taste as good," Ianto replied, wrinkling his nose.

"No, not really." Jack was quiet again. "Look, Ianto, I'm—"

"Jack, you don't have to apologize again." He turned to gaze at Jack with bright blue eyes. "It's not your fault."

"But I'm sorry I wouldn't let you talk about it in the car," Jack said. "I remember my first time like it was yesterday. If you need to talk about it, I can listen now."

Ianto moved over and took his hand. "Thank you. But I'm all right. Tosh listened."

"Yeah, same here," Jack murmured, squeezing back. "We're lucky to have her. I just hope she can change us back."

"She will," said Ianto.

"She will what?" asked Tosh right then, bursting into the office. She glanced down at their interlinked hands and smiled before looking up again. "Sorry to interrupt, but we've got another one."

Ianto groaned and Jack swore before he stood up, pulling Ianto with him. "When will it end?"

"As soon as we get rid of the damn device," Ianto grumbled, following them both out into the Hub. "Which will be as soon as we can switch back. Which can only happen if Tahlia Blake returns with another one." There was something in his voice that worried Jack, something that sounded as if Ianto were losing hope after all that had happened.

"She will," he said, squeezing his shoulder. "Trust me. She's a good person. One of the only good people I knew back then."

"But what if something happened to her?" asked Ianto. "Maybe you should have gone with her—"

Jack stared at him in disbelief; had Ianto actually suggested Jack run off with a beautiful Time Agent from his past? "And risk something happening to you? Or your body? No way. If she needs help, she'll find it. And she'll be back. Now," he said, turning to Tosh, "what do we have this time?"

"You're not going to like it," she said, turning her computer screen toward them. "It's the same one you just went after."

This time Ianto swore, but Jack nodded. "No, it makes sense. They frequently work in pairs. Now that its partner is in the back of the SUV, this one is looking for it, and will probably want revenge as well. Mixolydians are a loyal species. Which means it will be even more dangerous."

"Brilliant," muttered Ianto, his hand idly moving to his throat.

"There's more," said Tosh. "It brought friends." She advanced a few seconds of footage, and three of the green aliens who had started it all appeared next to the Mixolydian.

"But if the green ones stole it from the one with the bad accent, why are they working together?" asked Ianto.

Jack just stared at the CCTV, trying to puzzle it out. "Maybe they didn't steal it. Or maybe they did. Or perhaps they were always working together and something just went wrong. We still need to take them out, though." He blew out a breath. "Tosh, I hate leaving the Hub unprotected with the EED still here, but we need you on this one. Get your gear."

Tosh nodded as she typed a few things into her computer. "I've routed everything to my PDA. Let's go."

Jack turned to Ianto. "Mixolydians don't like insults. Rolling your eyes or making a smart comment would be considered an insult, unlike around here where we appreciate your dry wit and sass."

"Hence having my throat ripped out," said Ianto, nodding in understanding.

"Right. Just keep a straight face and let me talk, if you can. I don't want to go through that again."

"Me neither," said Ianto softly, and Jack touched his arm before they left, off to hunt their hunters once more.

* * *

They caught up with the aliens too close to the Hub, as if they somehow knew where to go, or least which direction to head. Pulling into Landsea Gardens, they found it virtually deserted and followed Tosh's lead. It wasn't long before they found the three green aliens (Jack should have known what they were, but he couldn't remember, it had been so long, and they were rarely in this part of the galaxy). Like all the others they demanded the EEP device, and like every time before, Jack refused.

But this time, without warning, the vicious Mixolydian stepped up behind him without a sound and held a gun to his back. Jack stiffened as it spoke in that strange cultured accent, so incongruous coming from a mouth full of jagged teeth.

"You killed my partner," it hissed in his ear, reaching around his coat to take the Webley from him. Tosh and Ianto whirled, guns raised, but could do little with the creature practically at Jack's throat—particularly when the three green aliens then stepped forward and pressed their own weapons to Tosh and Ianto's heads, quickly confiscating their guns as well.

"It killed mine first," Jack threw back. The alien cocked his head as he eyed Ianto and tried for a smile.

"He appears to have recovered. My partner will not, and nor will you."

"There's no point in threatening," said Jack, twisting around so he faced the thing head on. "We're not giving it up."

"It is of no use to you on this planet," said the alien. "Why keep it when it will cost you so much?"

"We need it for something else, and then we're going to destroy it."

The alien narrowed its yellow eyes at him. "You will not destroy it. We will destroy you first."

"Then good luck finding it when you do," said Jack, forgetting his own advice to Ianto about offensive comebacks. The alien reached out with lightning quick speed, grabbed his left wrist, and twisted, snapping it easily. Jack doubled over in pain.

"I do not think we will need such luck. Maybe a leg, a rib, a major artery…would that convince you?"

"I've had enough blood for today," said Jack, standing and cradling his wrist. He sensed Ianto take a step toward him and held up his good hand to stop him. He stared down the creature before him. "And I've been tortured before."

"How about the leg then?" asked the alien, and he lashed out powerfully, delivering a kick to Jack's (Ianto's) knee that twisted it out from underneath him so that he landed on the ground with a gasp. Jack almost wanted to laugh, but knew it would just draw more attention and abuse. He could practically feel Ianto seething behind him, forced to watch and unable to do anything.

"No deal," Jack ground out, standing up but favoring his left leg. He felt wretched for getting Ianto's body broken, but he couldn't give up the device. They needed to switch back, and then Tahlia would to take it to the Shadow Proclamation, where it could be guarded or destroyed. It was too dangerous a weapon to leave on the galactic market.

"I am not making a deal," said the alien. "I am not asking. Hand over the device or we will kill you."

"You can try." Once again Jack's mouth got the best of him; he almost couldn't help it. And then he realized what that meant for Ianto's body, and he cringed as the beast pressed two long, powerful fingers into his gut, pushed and twisted, and Jack felt a rib snap, gasping as a sharp pain flowed through his chest.

Jack was no stranger to pain, but he realized that the more he resisted, the more he would endure, and the less he would be able to fight back. And he would not heal from these injuries in a few hours like he normally would, had he been in his own body. He needed his wrist set, his knee wrapped, his rib mobilized. Yet he still couldn't give up the device.

"Jack!" cried Tosh. "Stop it! It's not worth your life, or Ianto's!"

He hadn't even realized he'd closed his eyes when he opened them to glance at her. The green aliens silenced her and wrenched Ianto's arms behind his back, almost hard enough to dislocate. Tosh looked worried but determined, and Ianto looked pissed off, like he was ready to turn on his alien and beat the shit out of him, only that would get them all killed…except Ianto.

Jack would die, leaving Ianto trapped with an eternity of living and dying, alone.

"You're right, it's not my life that's at stake," he said softly, standing straight once more and meeting Ianto's eyes. "It's his. I can risk my own, but I can't risk his life. I'm sorry."

"Jack, don't—" Ianto started, struggling again. The alien slammed him to his knees and put the gun to his head, barking something in its own language. The Mixolydian gave Jack another mouthful of teeth.

"I am glad you have decided to cooperate," it said. "Where is the device?"

"I don't have it here," Jack said, sighing wearily. "It's locked up somewhere safe."

"Take us to it."

Jack barked a painful laugh, regretting it almost instantly. "We only bring dead aliens into the Hub, sorry."

Fortunately the alien did not lash out at him for his reply. "Then it appears we are at a … what do you call it? A standoff?"

Jack shook his head. "A standstill. Let them go. They'll bring it back."

"No," said Ianto, and the alien holding him captive hit him hard along side the head so that he toppled over. He rose unsteadily to his feet, glaring at Jack. "I won't let you do this—"

"Tosh, do you have enough information to work with?" Jack asked, ignoring Ianto, who continued to glare at him. She nodded slowly.

"I think so. I'd prefer to keep it, though."

The Mixolydian narrowed its yellow eyes at them. "This one stays. He is important to you. You will not abandon him. Retrieve the device and return here, or he will die."

Two of the green aliens let go of Tosh and Ianto and trained their weapons on Jack. The Mixolydian strode quickly up to Ianto and offered its feral alien grin. "I will accompany you. I will not attempt to breach your security. This one will ensure your return with the device." And he grabbed Tosh around the upper arm and held his gun to her now. "Walk to your vehicle."

"Jack?" Ianto called as he was marched away at gunpoint by the third green alien. Jack could feel his injuries throbbing, pain running through his body when normally he would have begun to heal by now.

"I'll be fine," Jack called back, although he was starting to wonder about a punctured lung and really hoped they could finish this quick so he could get to Owen. He wasn't afraid of dying, not really, but he wasn't ready. After so many years, so many deaths, at that moment Jack did not want to die. He wanted to stay—with his team, and more importantly, with Ianto. Faced with his own mortality for the first time in years, Jack realized he still wasn't ready to die.

There was also the small problem of dying in Ianto's body, and he could not do that to the Welshman. He would not leave Ianto trapped with the curse of immortality, because he of all people knew how hard it was to live forever. Alone.

The green alien forced Ianto into the driver's seat while Tosh climbed into the back seat with the other. The SUV took off, and Jack let his head fall, feeling a terrible sense of powerlessness and defeat. In his own body he could take risks; in this one he was held back, tied down, restricted. Was that how Ianto felt when they were out in the field? Powerless? How did he manage to do the things he did, like tackle snarling aliens aiming for Jack's back?

With a sudden sharp insight, Jack understood. He did those things because he would always come back from whatever went wrong. He did not have to think about himself, only about the others, because he would always come back. Ianto did it because he too thought about the others, only he did not think about himself because he had accepted that sacrifice might be necessary for saving the world…or someone you cared for. And Ianto was willing to make that sacrifice, even if it meant his life.

Shaking his head at his ignorance all this time, Jack finally understood. He understood why Ianto hated watching Jack sacrifice himself, and he understood why Ianto was willing to die for him. It made him want to fight back even more, and yet he was not immortal now; he was badly injured, and it hurt so much…

The SUV was out of sight. Jack would have to wait for Tosh and Ianto to return with the EED and only hope the Mixolydian really did let them go. Somehow he doubted it, and he hoped Tosh and Ianto were thinking of ways to escape just as hard as he was.

He didn't have long to think, however, for all of a sudden one of the aliens fell to the ground, dead. Jack turned in surprise, squinting into the darkness to see who was there. The remaining alien stepped closer, as if using Jack as a shield.

"Jack, duck!" shouted Ianto, and as he did, a shot rang out and the second alien dropped. Jack was surrounded by dead green aliens; a gurgling laugh escaped him as Tosh and Ianto ran over, Ianto wrapping an arm around Jack's shoulder to help him stand

"Nice work," murmured Jack. "How did you manage it?"

"It might sound smart, but that thing was really rather dumb," said Tosh with a shrug. She was checking over the green aliens and taking their weapons back. "Ianto crashed the SUV—"

"You what?" asked Jack, and Ianto shook his head.

"I thought I saw a stray dog and lightly bumped into a rubbish bin trying to avoid it," he said with a shrug. "It was mostly brake work. Might want to have them looked at."

"—which distracted the alien enough for me to knock it out with the med kit lying on the seat next to me. Ianto punched him in the face." Tosh stood and smiled sadly. "They're both tied up in the back, but these two dead. Sorry, Jack."

Jack motioned her closer and pulled her into a hug. "Don't be sorry. You did good. Thank you." He coughed and felt the taste of blood. He tried not to let the alarm show on his face, but Tosh stepped back and frowned.

"You're hurt," she said. "We need to get back to the Hub."

"We need to clean up the bodies," Jack said. He was feeling weaker by the minute, now that the adrenaline had likely washed out of his system. It was an unusual feeling that he did not like. He was scared, and not just for himself, but for Ianto as well; he clung to the man a bit more than he would have liked, because he was determined not to leave him.

"You need to get back to the Hub," Ianto said. "Tosh, can you stay? I'll call Gwen and Owen and have Owen meet us at the Hub, then send Gwen to you."

"That's fine," Tosh said, nodding in concern. "Just get him back quickly. I'll be waiting."

Ianto led Jack toward the SUV, tapping his com as they walked. "Owen, where are you?"

"We're about ten minutes from the Hub, Teaboy. Got some Weevils for you to lock up."

"Don't worry about them right now. Jack's hurt and Tosh needs help with some bodies. Meet us at the Hub as fast as you can. Gwen, are you there?"

"I'm here, Ianto. Is Jack all right?"

"He's…" Ianto trailed off, and Jack saw a look of fear and anger cross his face. Was Ianto mad at him? No, he hadn't done anything stupid, except maybe run his mouth a bit, but that was just him, it was the alien who'd broken his wrist and knee and rib…

"He's not good. Seems to have forgotten he's not immortal," Ianto finished dryly. "I need you to help Tosh with some clean up so Owen can treat him."

"We'll be there as soon as we can, Ianto. Hang on, Jack."

Jack nodded silently. He was limping pretty badly now and could hardly feel his right hand. Breathing was becoming more and more difficult.

"Stay with me, Jack," said Ianto fiercely. "I am not losing you, not now, not like this."

He helped Jack into the back of the SUV. Jack laid down, cradling his wrist to his chest. "I'm sorry," he murmured. Ianto leaned in and kissed him gently.

"What for?" he asked as he hurried to the front, jumped in, and started the car. He pulled out quickly and sped through the empty gardens back toward the Hub.

"For getting you beat up," said Jack and laughed at the strange context of his statement. "I should have taken better care of your body."

"It's not like I haven't had a broken wrist, leg, or rib before," Ianto replied, his voice falsely light.

"All at once?" Jack tossed back, trying to stay awake.

"Well, maybe not all at once." He could imagine Ianto trying not to smile.

"How about a punctured lung?" asked Jack as he coughed and tasted blood again. Ianto glanced sharply at him, his eyes wide with alarm.

"That's a new one. Just stay still, Jack. And stay with me. We're almost there."

"Thank you," said Jack, finally too exhausted from the pain to resist the pull toward unconsciousness anymore.

"For what? Talk to me, Jack."

Jack felt the darkness surround him and he wondered if this time there would be something more, something else. Yet he pushed away the thought, because he did not want to die, not now—not when he understood so much more.

And not when he had Ianto to live for.

  


 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This was a tough one. But I wanted the parallel to Ianto's chapter, the chance for Jack to gain another understanding of something very important that bothered him back in Chapter 2. Hope that came across. Thanks again for reading!


	8. The Return

"Goddammit Owen, if you can't fix this, I'll kill you both."

"Relax, tea boy. Jack—and your rather beat-up body—is going to be all right."

"He vomited blood all over me, Owen. How is that all right?"

"Because I happen to be a damn good doctor who also has access to some brilliant pieces of alien technology. His—or your—lungs are fine now thanks to the wonders of a very handy Solaran medical device that fell through the Rift one rainy day."

"I always liked the Solarans," Jack murmured, finally opening his eyes. "Kinky little race, could do whatever they wanted in bed and just heal themselves up with all those fancy little gadgets, even reattach their—"

"Jack, that's babbling," said Ianto, trying to hold back a smile.

"So are you," said Jack, and then frowned. "No you're not. Why did I just say that?"

"Because you're hopped up on all sorts of fun drugs," said Owen, stepping forward and forcing Ianto to move back. "Welcome back to the land of the living."

"Did I die?" asked Jack, suddenly wide-eyed. Owen jumped at the opportunity to check Jack's vision.

"Of course not, you ninny. You'd be dead if you died." Ianto sucked in a breath, and Owen threw an apologetic look over his shoulder. "Sorry, mate. Cold but true."

"I don't get it," said Jack. Ianto moved around to the other side of the bed. Jack's eyes were bleary and unfocused, his face grey and tired-looking.

"Don't worry about it," Ianto said softly. Inside he was shaking, though, because Owen's words were frightening: for the first time since Ianto had known him, Jack had actually come close to dying.

"Worry about what?" asked Jack. He tried to sit up, but he couldn't get his arms beneath him, they were so floppy and relaxed. Ianto laughed, nervous energy needing to burst forth somehow, someway.

"I am definitely keeping this CCTV footage," Owen murmured to himself.

"Send me a copy," Ianto said, and the doctor snorted.

"Me too," said Jack, collapsing back onto the bed. "Then maybe I'll know what the hell is going on."

Ianto leaned closer, taking Jack's hand and pointedly ignoring Owen standing so close and watching. "You were hurt, Jack. Pretty bad, but you're going to be fine. You're on some pain medications, and you probably haven't experienced the side effects of something like that for…well, a long, long time."

"Why not?" asked Jack. "Can't be the first time I got beat up. I remember this time on Abraxas Five, when I—"

"Jack," said Owen, his voice strict. "Look at me." Jack turned unfocused eyes with difficulty toward Owen. "You're rambling again so shut up. You have a broken wrist that I've set and a sprained knee that I've used some funky alien cream on and wrapped. The punctured lung is fixed."

"By the Solarans," murmured Jack somewhat dreamily. Ianto didn't even want to know what Jack was thinking about based on the look on his face, and glanced up at Owen, who was trying hard not to laugh.

"By the Solarans. Who apparently only saw fit to invent a way to heal soft tissue injuries and not mend broken bones. Sorry about that."

"S'not your fault," Jack said, letting his eyes fall shut. "They don't have any bones. Nice and flexible."

This time Owen did laugh, and although Ianto threw him the best evil eye he could manage, when he glanced back down at Jack, alive and all right but so, so out of it, he couldn't help but grin as well.

And when Jack abruptly started snoring, he lost it, turning around and chuckling silently to himself, shoulders shaking with laughter until he suddenly realized why he was laughing and just like that, as if someone had flipped a switch deep inside, he was rubbing his face and trying not to sob instead

Jack could have died.  _Died._  And not only would he be gone forever, but Ianto would be stuck in Jack's immortal body...forever

Ianto was only mildly surprised that the former bothered him far more than the latter. It wasn't immortality that scared him as much as the thought of living without Jack. He had come to rely on Jack, to trust and even need him. Whatever they had was not something Ianto was ready to let go of yet, regardless of how enigmatic it was, how ambiguous and undefined. Ianto had lost people, but right then he couldn't imagine anything worse than losing Jack; he wasn't sure how he would survive it.

Which was when he let his head fall back and laughed again, because he suddenly got it. All of it, an unexpected revelation that exploded within his soul. And so he laughed, almost to the point of tears.

"Ianto?" asked a surprisingly gentle voice behind him. He turned to find Owen eyeing him a bit warily. "You okay, mate?"

Ianto tried to compose his features, but suspected he had failed since they weren't really his, and Owen was watching him with a look of sympathy Ianto could rarely remember receiving on the medical table.

"Yeah, I'm fine. It didn't hurt me, just Jack," he replied.

"Physically, yeah," said Owen. "But it's got to be tough watching yourself get beat up like that."

Ianto frowned and shook his head. "I wasn't watching myself, Owen. I was watching  _Jack._  I was watching Jack get tortured and there wasn't a damn thing I could do about it."

Owen nodded as if to placate Ianto's sudden turn of mood. "He'll be all right—full recovery, I promise."

"That's not the point," Ianto said, wearily waving his hand through the air as if he could just dismiss it.

"What is then?" Owen asked bluntly, piercing Ianto with determined look.

"Forget it," Ianto mumbled, trying to move away, but the doctor wouldn't let him. "You wouldn't understand."

"No, but it's my job as the team doctor to make sure you two are all right with the repercussions of this crazy body swap."

"I'm fine," said Ianto, hoping his tone of voice alone would signal Owen to back off.

"Tosh told me you died earlier," Owen said, crossing his arms over his chest. "How'd that work out for you?"

Ianto narrowed his eyes, anger building in his chest that deflated just as quickly as it had appeared.

"It was horrible," Ianto whispered, looking down at the floor for some reason. "You don't want to know."

"You're right, I don't," said Owen. "What I want to know is how you're handling it."

Ianto felt his face contort as he tried to articulate all the thoughts racing madly through his mind.

"I was," he finally admitted. "Handling it, that is. It was dark and cold and painful, but more than that, it was…insightful."

Owen snorted. "Trust you to turn it into a learning experience. You're such a bloody Ravenclaw sometimes."

Ianto ignored the sad attempt at a joke, especially since it was often true, the way he looked at things and tried to learn from them. "I understand what he goes through now, when he dies and revives. And he does it anyway, for us, every time."

Owen was silent as Ianto continued, rambling thoughts that had he had half discussed with Tosh pouring out as he stood before Owen.

"Tonight was different. He could have  _actually_ died _,_  yet he was still willing to sacrifice himself, still willing to die if it meant we lived."

"It's not about it being your body, is it?" asked the doctor, obviously trying his best to understand.

"Of course not," snapped Ianto. "I had to watch him suffer, Owen. He could have died for us, for me, and then…then what?"

There was a long pause. "Then you'd be immortal," Owen said softly. "Forever."

"Dammit, that's still not the point!" Ianto exclaimed.

"Then what is?" asked Owen, seeming to lose his patience. "Do you even know?"

"Of course I do, you prat. I get it, alright?" Ianto stepped away and turned his back to the doctor. "I get it now, all of it. I understand why he gets so upset every time we're in danger, every time one of us is hurt, and I understand why he would sacrifice himself because he can't stand the thought of losing one of us. I know what it's like to be on both sides, and it's just…"

"…pretty damn amazing, if you ask me," murmured a voice behind them. Ianto whirled to see Jack watching him with tired, sad eyes, but eyes that were somehow much clearer now. Jack reached out a hand, and Ianto hurried over to take it, ignoring Owen's eye roll as he busied himself at the computer to check Jack's vitals, as if to give them privacy.

"Jack, I'm sorry," Ianto said. "I'm sorry for what you have to go through, I'm sorry for putting you through it, I'm sorry for everything—"

"Stop it," Jack laughed, coughing lightly, and for a moment Ianto feared more blood would come bubbling forth, like it had earlier. "It's not your fault, and it's not my fault. It's just who we are."

Ianto nodded in understanding. "Two incredibly messed up people?" he offered, though a tiny smile pulled at the corners of his mouth.

"Something like that," said Jack, smiling back. "And we're Torchwood. Yet maybe in a way we're also two lucky people. Now we really do know what it's like to walk that mile."

"Ohhhhh," said Owen from his computer, then turned and gave them an uncommonly sheepish smile before looking back at his screens. "Sorry, just got it myself. I'll leave you two to your deep understandings. Although maybe the rest of us should try swapping bodies—team building and all that."

"No way," said Jack and Ianto at the same time. Ianto knew from experience that living another person's life might let you into their thoughts and feelings, but now that he had lived a bit of Jack's life, he almost dreaded going back to being  _himself,_  to having to watch Jack suffer the pain of his deaths and resurrections, to being the one who made Jack worry so much when he was injured and in danger. Jack squeezed his hand in understanding, as if he too knew that things would be different when they changed back.

Their private moment was interrupted when the cog alarms went off and Gwen burst in. "Jack!" she called. "We've got a visitor!"

Jack groaned as he rolled to his side and sat up, legs dangling from the table. "Tell me it's not another alien," he said. Ianto laid a steady hand on Jack's shoulder, hoping the same.

"I'm as alien as you are," said a familiar female voice. Ianto looked up to see Tahlia Blake following Gwen into the medical bay. She stopped at the bottom of the stairs and narrowed her eyes at Jack and Ianto. "You two still messed up?" she asked, using the exact same words Ianto had just used.

"More than ever," Jack muttered, earning a snort from Owen that Tahlia ignored.

"I can see that now," she said frowning at the injuries to Ianto's body. "You look like hell."

"Don't worry, I feel great," said Jack, but there was a definite lack of conviction in the forced lightness of his voice. "So did you get one?"

"Already with your beautiful techie," Tahlia said. "So what happened?" She walked over to Jack, but turned to Ianto instead. "Are you all right?"

"I'm fine, thanks for asking," Jack answered sarcastically. Tahlia gave him a grin.

"Sorry, but you're obviously hurt, so I thought I'd ask him instead." She eyed Ianto again. "He seems like the strong, silent type who probably doesn't say much."

Owen let out another noise before turning around. "You've pegged him dead right," he said, then stopped, goggled a bit at the woman before him, and hurried forward. "Owen Harper, medical doctor," he said, offering his hand. "You must be Tahlia Blake."

Jack and Ianto rolled their eyes in tandem, causing Gwen to giggle.

"That would be me," Tahlia acknowledged with a wink before turning back to Jack. "You have a hell of a good-looking team here, Harkness. You know that, right?"

"Take your pick," Jack replied just as cheekily. "Except this one, he's mine." And he laid his hand on Ianto's. Ianto saw Gwen and Owen exchange a look; Tahlia merely raised her eyebrows.

"That was obvious from the start," she said. She sauntered up to Ianto and ran a hand down his chest. "And while I might like the Mr. Jones in here, he looks far too much like you at the moment."

"Hey!" said Jack, as once again Gwen chuckled, this time with Owen joining in.

"The rare woman who hasn't fallen for the Harkness charm," Owen said. "I didn't think they existed."

"There's a fair few of us," she replied, glancing over her shoulder with a smile before turning back to Ianto. "But maybe once Tosh fixes you, Jack will reconsider sharing." Tahlia whispered this to Ianto, though they all clearly heard it. He tried not to blush as he gave her a broad Jack smile in return; she wrinkled her nose.

"Don't do that. It's a real turn off."

"Hey!" said Jack again, and this time Ianto couldn't help but laugh with the rest of them. Oddly enough, he was immensely glad for Tahlia's timing. Whatever was going on between him and Jack was becoming rather intense and confusing, and Ianto just wanted his own body, his own  _life_  back now.

"How did you find us?" Ianto asked, hoping to change the subject. Tahlia smiled at him—a genuine smile that he thought was for him but couldn't be sure wasn't for Jack in spite of her other words.

"I tracked your SUV," she said with a casual shrug. "Which is where I found your people cleaning up some dead bodies." She glanced back at Jack, with his broken wrist and swollen knee. "I'm guessing they did this to you?"

"Don't worry, we won," said Jack, and Ianto rolled his eyes at the man's need for glibness in any situation.

"They were looking for the device," Ianto told her. "Just like every other bounty hunter who's buzzed us all week."

"Fun times, huh?" asked Tahlia. "I love running from bounty hunters." Owen was staring at her with his mouth hanging open, and she mimed closing it to him. Gwen coughed her laughter into her hand.

"I don't," Jack said, lifting himself off the table to gingerly put some weight on his leg. "At least not anymore, thank you very much." Ianto steadied him, as he had many times before, only this time it was because Jack was hurt and wouldn't be healing any time soon. It was a peculiar and upsetting thing to realize. "How did you make out?"

"It took me trolling a few markets to track one down," she said. "They're not as available in this time, apparently, and I don't time jump much anymore." She paused and shrugged. "Ran into a bit of trouble here and there, but finally managed to find one in Frenko."

Jack gave her a surprised look. "How many people did you kill?"

"Jack, I don't shoot first and talk later, remember?" she protested. "I didn't kill anyone." She paused. "I slept with her."

"Damn," muttered Owen under his breath, and Gwen elbowed him.

"And the Voraxx?" asked Jack.

"Not a problem," she replied, though Ianto thought she might have been skirting the truth.

"So how much did it cost?" Jack asked.

"Quite a bit," she said, rocking on her heels. "I did to try and bring down the price, but you owe me a good chunk of change, Harkness."

"If it works."

"Oh, it works," said Tahlia, glancing up out of the medical bay. "It's just a question of whether your tech can get it to work with your device."

"She can," said Ianto at exactly the same time Jack said, "She will."

Tahlia laughed, her voice surprisingly light. "You boys are cute. Now, do you mind if I hang around here a bit until I get my money and the other device?"

"Of course not," said Jack. "I'll even give you a tour so you know what else to keep away from."

"You mean besides him? How boring." She frowned at Jack's leg. "Shouldn't you be resting? Ianto can show me around, right?" She linked arms with Ianto and winked. Jack started to protest, looking miserable, and Ianto knew it was not just because he was walking away with a beautiful woman; Jack wasn't used to being hurt and not healing quickly, and he certainly wasn't used to rejection.

And so even though they were normally very private, Ianto kissed Jack very publicly right there in the medical bay. Owen snorted, Gwen giggled again, and Tahlia Blake pretended to sigh heavily. Then he left to show her around the Hub.

But first he wanted to check with Tosh, to see how long it would take until she'd be able to switch them back before one of them was really hurt—or worse, died.

 

 


	9. The Sacrifice

It took Tosh about twenty-four hours to examine the new alien device, figure out how it worked, and rig up the old one to switch them back.

Because of course the new one didn't work with whatever the prototype weapon had done; they tried that as soon as Jack was up for it.

In the meantime, Ianto died again and Jack managed to add a split lip and bruised jaw to the list of wrongs he'd managed to do to Ianto's body. Not that Ianto was keeping track, but he was starting to look less and less forward to finding himself back in a body that was going to hurt like the devil as opposed to a body that could take a bullet in the heart and walk away an hour later.

Ianto wasn't sure which of them had been more affected by their weeklong sojourn in one another's life. On the one hand, Ianto had a deeper understanding than he'd ever expected of what Jack experienced every time he died and revived. Ianto also knew what it was like to watch the other man put himself in danger and walk away seriously injured; before he'd always had faith that Jack would be all right even though he hated seeing Jack get hurt. Yet for one long week he had lost that faith, because every day was another day Jack could have actually died.

Jack seemed to be taking it harder, though. Ianto wondered if Jack just missed his own body—his immortality, his pheromones (although he wasn't really complaining about being on the receiving end of those), and the much-needed confidence both gave him. Maybe he was in pain and unused to not being able to heal quickly. Or maybe he understood now how hard it was to watch Ianto throw himself recklessly at every alien that jumped out at them and get killed.

Because that was how he'd been shot, of course. They hadn't even been out on a mission, but walking slowly from the parking lot to Ianto's flat late the night Tahlia Blake had arrived. A scaly purple shape had appeared from behind a car at the exact same moment both of their mobile phones had gone off. Though distracted, Ianto had instinctively stepped in front of Jack, got shot, and crumpled immediately. He only found out upon reviving that Jack had whipped out his Webley and shot the thing straight through the eye. And that their simultaneous texts had been from Tosh alerting them to Rift activity near Ianto's flat.

_Too late, Ianto's dead,_ Jack had texted her back angrily. Or rather, Ianto had sensed Jack's anger when he had come to on his sofa. Being shot was quite different than bleeding out. It was quick and relatively straightforward, and since he had known what to expect, the darkness, the taunting light, and the painful jerk to reality had not been as much of a shock as it had been the first time.

Waking up to Jack looking pissed off had been new, unexpected, and slightly humbling.

They spent the night huddled close together, all anger forgiven quickly; too many close calls had worn thin the novelty of what had started out as amusing adventure. Jack slept in, and Ianto let him, knowing the needs of a mortal body well. He spoke with Tosh, who had Tahlia hanging over her shoulder, and promised to be in as soon as Jack was up.

Which took longer than it might have, perhaps, as Jack was still Jack deep down and insisted on Ianto joining him for a lazy shower and one more exploration of all those things experienced so differently in one another's body. It was close to lunchtime by the time they arrived, Gwen and Owen were out chasing Weevils, and Tosh said she was close to figuring it out.

Tahlia Blake looked relieved to see them. But then she narrowed her eyes at both of them before hauling back and slapping Jack across the face.

"What the hell was that for?" he demanded while Ianto just stared open-mouthed at her.

"That's for being a galactic arsehole and letting your partner die last night," she snapped. Jack and Ianto turned as one toward Tosh.

"Sorry," she murmured, still engrossed with the two alien body-swapping devices. "She didn't understand your text and wouldn't leave me alone until I explained it."

"Jack Harkness, immortal con man," Tahlia said, shaking her head in disbelief. "Just what the universe needed." Then she turned to Ianto. "Are you all right?" she asked, sounding genuinely concerned.

"I'm alive," Ianto shrugged. He really didn't understand this woman from Jack's past. Another former Time Agent, she not only seemed to have far more principles than John Hart (not to mention Jack, as he had heard from many a story), but she seemed to have a unique love/hate relationship with Jack himself. As if she cared, but he still pissed her off to no end. A bit like an annoying, overbearing, beautiful sister. He had asked Jack about her, but Jack had shrugged, admitting that there was simply not much to share: Tahlia Blake had been a Time Agent with him, yes, but she had been a better person than all of them, almost too good for the Time Agency. Had they slept together? Of course, everyone slept with everyone in the Agency, especially while hopping through time: a familiar face was a warm, welcome body in bed. Yet apparently it had never been anything more than a casual encounter or two.

Right now she looked like she wanted to either snog Ianto senseless or slap him as well, and Ianto still wasn't sure if it was because he was wearing Jack's face or because of who he actually was. It was too confusing; he would be glad to have his own body back, broken wrist and all.

"I'm fine," he said, more gently this time. "Thank you for being concerned, but we're handling it all right, we just need to get back to the way we were." He turned to Tosh, hoping to diffuse some of the tension in the room. "How's it coming, Tosh?" he asked. Jack was standing back, still scowling, but Tahlia nodded as she watched Ianto handle things calmly before walking over to Jack. Ianto half listened to them, glancing occasionally over his shoulder as he tried to follow Tosh's unique brand of techno-babble.

"I'm sorry," Tahlia said softly. "I just couldn't believe it when Tosh told me."

Jack stared at her rather blankly; was that what Ianto looked like when he was trying to hide his emotions? "I wasn't thrilled when I found out either."

"How long has it been?" she asked.

"A long time," he said stiffly.

She was quiet as she studied him. Something about subatomic particles from Tosh went right over Ianto's head.

"Are you okay?" she asked Jack, reaching out to brush a finger along his split lip. He pulled back, and she apologized, then repeated her question. "Jack, are you all right? And not the lip—everything else."

"I'm fine," he finally sighed. "I've had a long time to get used to it." He lowered his voice, but Ianto could still hear him, even while nodding his head at whatever Tosh was saying about tachyon radiation; hopefully it wasn't important enough to remember.

"I can't leave things like this, though," he told her. "I don't want Ianto to go through what I've gone through."

"He seems like a strong man," Tahlia pointed out, and Ianto tried not to smile to himself. Damn right.

"He is," Jack said. "But this is something I wouldn't wish on my worst enemy. The reality of living forever is nothing like the fantasy of poets and dreamers."

Ianto closed his eyes and sighed, because Jack's pain was tangible even so many steps away. And that was when he realized how much worse this probably was for Jack, because Jack had lived with his immortality for well over a hundred years; Ianto had tried it out for a week. Yes, he knew what it was like to die, but he couldn't quite imagine outliving his friends, his family…Jack.

But he realized he would, if it meant sparing Jack the pain he had already endured for far too long.

Letting his head fall to his chest, Ianto stopped Tosh mid-sentence. "I'm sorry, I can't follow a thing you're saying," he apologized. Tosh gave him an understanding glance.

"It's a bit technical, I know," she said, but Ianto shook his head.

"No, it's not that," he said, glancing back at where Jack was still speaking with Tahlia. He turned to Tosh and lowered his voice. "I'm just distracted. Tosh, do you really think you'll be able to do it?"

She gave him a long look before answering. "I think the better question is, do you want me to?"

Ianto felt his jaw drop; how could she read him so easily, especially in Jack's body? Again she seemed to read his mind.

"I know you, Ianto," she said quietly, leaning close. "I know you don't want his body or his life, but that you would do anything to spare him from suffering any more." Ianto didn't say anything, and she continued, laying a hand on his arm. "You can't do that, Ianto. You can't take what he is away from him, not now. And you know he'd never forgive you. Could you live with that…forever?"

Ianto just stared at her, struck speechless. She had quickly, efficiently, and ruthlessly cut to the heart of the matter. Could he live for eons knowing Jack hated him for taking on the curse of immortality as his own? He would, to spare Jack the centuries of a life doomed to last forever, but could he do it at the cost of their relationship?

"You think you can," whispered Tosh, "but I don't think anyone could, really. Jack barely manages, and he's stronger than us all. Don't even think about it, Ianto. Live your own life, and enjoy your time with Jack. You'll lose everything if you think about giving it up."

Ianto kissed her on the temple and turned back to Jack to find the other man watching him as if he knew exactly what Ianto had been talking to Tosh about. Tahlia Blake was glancing back and forth between them, a look of puzzled compassion on her face. The silence was almost deafening.

"I put on some satin sheets this morning," she finally said, obviously hoping to diffuse the tension. "Downstairs."

"You have satin sheets?" Ianto asked Jack, who grinned and shook his head.

"Nope, too slippery."

"I brought them myself." Tahlia shrugged. "Just in case."

Ianto laughed to himself and went to make some coffee. "Is that a no?" she called after him.

"Trust me, his coffee is almost as good as sex," he heard Jack say.

With a sad smile, Ianto hoped tomorrow he'd been making coffee in his own body, even though the cost would be high.

* * *

Jack couldn't believe Ianto would consider staying the way they were and taking on his immortality, all to spare him. Ianto would risk a lifetime of pain, regret, and loneliness  _for him._  It was a little stunning in its implication, but at the same time, Jack felt like he knew Ianto much better now that he had spent a week in the Welshman's skin. And of course Ianto would want to do such a thing, just like Jack never hesitated to give his own life to protect Ianto and the rest of the team.

The difference was that Jack knew he'd come back. Ianto was willing to risk everything, even his very soul, for Jack. Jack risked injury and pain and even death that was finite, not forever.

And it shamed him to think that there was this small part of him, deep down, that would seriously consider such a thing. There were times Jack wanted more than anything to be mortal, and now he was. If he had been in anyone else's body but Ianto's, he might not think so hard about going back to his own. But he could never, ever do such a thing to Ianto: he cared about Ianto too much to condemn the other man to an eternity of grief and loss. And Ianto cared so much he was willing to take on that burden if it eased Jack's sorrow.

And so they had walked the proverbial mile in one another's shoes for Jack to realize that in spite of all his efforts to stay slightly detached, to avoid commitment, to not fall into a relationship that he knew would only end up hurting him again…he had. He couldn't admit what it was, not yet, but whatever it was, it was so important to both of them that they were willing to risk their lives for the other. And while Jack's heart filled at the thought of sharing such a thing with a man like Ianto Jones, it also broke because he had wanted so hard to avoid the unavoidable pain he knew it would inevitably cause both of them.

It was too late now; what was done was done. They had experienced enough as one another now and needed to switch back before it became too much for them to handle. More than anything, Jack did not want to watch Ianto die again. He checked with Tosh, who said she should be ready by dinner.

He and Ianto snuck out for the afternoon, walking (or limping a bit in Jack's case) along the Quay, sometimes talking, sometimes simply enjoying the silence and one another's presence, and always keeping an eye open for bounty hunters. Jack felt like they should be saying more, that they should somehow bring closure to this thing between them before it was finally over and they switched back, but he couldn't make himself start the conversation, and Ianto didn't seem able to either. So they returned to the Hub, which was thankfully quiet, made their way downstairs, and enjoyed their last time together in one another's bodies—literally and figuratively. They took their time, careful of Jack's injuries, and when they returned to Tosh's station, she smiled at them, as if she knew exactly what they had been doing and what they were feeling. Jack almost wanted to kiss her.

Until she said it would be a while longer; she wasn't sure how safe the transfer back would be, mentally or physically. She was trying to jury-rig one piece of alien tech to reverse something another piece of alien tech had done, something that was hundreds of years beyond anything human technology—even human understanding—was capable of. Jack saw how nervous she was and gave her a supportive hug, telling her to take her time. Ianto ordered food for them all; Tosh ate at her station, Tahlia Grace by her side helping when she could, which mostly included reminding Tosh to eat.

As they watched Tosh work, the Hub grew quieter and quieter in anticipation. Owen left to find something to do in the medical bay, and Gwen went somewhere to make a phone call, probably to Rhys. Jack and Ianto sat across from one another, and an uncomfortable silence stretched before them.

"Jack?" Ianto finally spoke softly, glancing over at Tosh to see if she was listening. She was still working furiously, the look on her face one of grim determination, as if she hoped by staring or even yelling at the damn things they would work for her.

"Yeah?" asked Jack, setting down the rare beer he enjoyed with the team; it seemed like if there was ever a night to relax with a drink, this was it.

"I just want you to know—" he started, but Jack hung his head and waved him off.

"I know," he said softly.

"No, Jack, you don't." Ianto took a deep breath and held up his hand. "Or, if you do, let me say it anyway." When Jack nodded reluctantly, Ianto continued. "I want you to know…if it doesn't work, it we're stuck like this…I'm okay with that, Jack. I really am."

Jack shook his head. "I'm not. I don't want you to have to deal with what I deal with. I don't want you to live forever—I wouldn't wish that on anyone." His voice dropped to a whisper. "I couldn't bear it, knowing you were suffering my curse."

"But if it happens Jack, it'll be all right. I'll be fine with it." Ianto leaned across the table and reached for his hand, which Jack squeezed hard to hold back the tears. "Because your suffering would be over, and that would be worth it."

Jack held back a sob. "Don't say that," he whispered. "Please, don't say that. You can't make that kind of sacrifice, because you don't really know."

"I don't," Ianto acknowledged far too calmly. "But I know it hurts you, and that hurts me. Knowing you would be able to live a normal life would make any sacrifice one that I'm willing to make."

"No!" Jack hissed, dropping Ianto's hand and glaring at him across the table. "That's not fair, because then you'd be sacrificing  _my_  peace of mind,  _my_  happiness. Do you think I could stand it, knowing I stole your life, your normal, mortal life? Do you think I could bear watching you die and come back, knowing it was supposed to be me? Do you think it would ease one bit of my pain knowing the anguish you would suffer as an immortal?" He stood, his fists clenched at his sides as he turned away from Ianto, from this crazy, selfless man who had already offered so much and was now offering more than Jack could ever accept. "It's not worth it, Ianto.  _I'm_  not worth it."

He felt Ianto stand behind him, felt a strong pair of strong arms wrap around his waist. Jack's breath was coming in hitches, and he struggled to stay calm, to not let anyone see him break down, not now. They were too close to making it through; he needed to hold it together.

"You are worth it," said Ianto softly. "But it'll work. Tosh is close. She'll figure it out and it'll work."

Jack nodded, his jaw still clenched tight so it didn't quiver, willing himself to believe Ianto's words.

"It'll be different, though," Ianto said, resting his head on Jack's shoulder, his breath ghosting against Jack's ear as a sad sigh. "When we're back. And I don't mean physically."

Jack took a deep breath. Strangely enough the uncertainty he heard in Ianto's voice filled Jack with a calm reassurance. It would be different, he knew that, but it would also be better. Turning, he took Ianto's face in his hands, brushing his thumbs across the man's chin and over his lips, not even seeing the face that was his, just seeing  _Ianto_.

"It will be different," Jack agreed. "But it will be even more amazing than it was before, and I can't wait for that."

Ianto's eyes widened, and Jack grinned. He had no doubt of it: they would come through this even stronger for it because something deep down had changed in both of them. Jack leaned closer, intending to kiss the man before him like there was no tomorrow, but from the other side of the Hub Tosh suddenly called out.

"I think I've got it!"

Ianto raised an eyebrow; Jack kissed him quick but hard, and together they hurried over to Tosh's station, ready to return to their own lives.

  


 


	10. The Switch (Redux)

"I think I've figured it out," said Tosh as they all gathered around her workstation. "Well, I'm fairly sure I understand how it works in terms of the technology, but I have no idea how it works metaphysically." She sounded frustrated at that last, but the concept of the human soul was still so rooted in theology and not biology that Jack wasn't surprised. He gave her an understanding smile.

"Give it a few hundred years," he said. "Science will conquer faith by then."

She cocked her head and gave him a quizzical look. "And then what?" she asked. "Where does that leave the faithful who have no understanding of science?"

"Oh, there are still plenty of unanswered questions out there," he said with a short laugh. "Especially the biggest one of all. Which we are not here to answer at the moment. Our question is whether or not you can swap us back."

"Yes," she said, sounding confident. "I've studied the device Tahlia brought back and isolated the way it reverses the process. I then adapted the circuits on our device to match it. I've run a dozen tests and after a few false starts, it works exactly as it should." She paused. "In theory, of course."

Jack glanced at Ianto to try and get some sense of the other man's thoughts. Ianto looked pensive, as if he were once again contemplating not switching back. Jack frowned and shook his head at Ianto, knowing exactly what Ianto would suggest if allowed to speak. "We're doing it. What's the worst that cold happen?"

"It doesn't work, and we try again," Tosh replied pragmatically. "None of my tests indicated any other issues."

"Death?" asked Owen, and Jack threw him an exasperated look.

"Try and keep it positive, Owen," he snapped. "These are our souls we're talking about here."

"Sorry, just want to be prepared—as the medical doctor and all." Owen shrugged unapologetically.

"It didn't kill us the first time," Ianto pointed out. "Why would it now?"

"Because we don't really understand  _how_  it works even if we can replicate it," said Owen. "Tahlia said the one we came across is a weapon now. It's supposed to be permanent." He stopped and gazed at the others. "What if there's some sort of failsafe built in? To keep the original owner of a stolen body from reclaiming it?"

Jack looked to Tosh, who was actually smiling. "I thought of that," she said. "And I searched for every sort of failsafe or backup system I could find. There was nothing. It's pretty straightforward, actually. They probably haven't thought of that yet, especially if they're still developing it."

"That's because they haven't met you and your devious mind," said Ianto with a small wink at Tosh, who blushed and smiled.

"Yes, well, that doesn't mean I didn't miss something. My main concern is the power source. Somehow my scanner tripped it the first time, since Jack thought it was broken when you brought it in. But it hasn't worked since then. So with my new wiring, I've had to figure out a different way of powering it—something more consistent and predictable."

"Which is?" asked Jack, and Tosh pointed to a large car battery nearby.

"Regular old electrical-chemical energy. I thought about trying to tap into the Rift, but I wasn't sure how that would affect your unique…physiology, Jack," she said. "So I've wired it to a self-contained source that should be strong enough to power it and switch you back."

"What if it's too powerful?" asked Ianto, voicing his doubts. "I know it's just the spare SUV battery, but given the size of the device, what if it's too much?"

"We're talking swapping souls, Ianto," said Owen. "That's got to take a lot of energy."

Ianto still looked unsure. "But a car battery is entirely different from a scanner in terms of energy output. What if it's too much?"

"Then it could destroy it, and I'd have to start over," Tosh said, meeting Ianto's eyes with a rueful shrug. "But it's worked on all my tests."

"None of your tests have included live subjects," he pointed out. "Live subjects contribute their own energy, energy that was obviously present when we first switched."

"I tried to take that into account," she said. "Although I had to guess at Jack's, given his ability to regenerate. It should work, Ianto. If anything, I'd be more worried it wasn't enough, and then we'd have to find a bigger power source."

"If it's too much, they'll just get an extra large electrical shock, right?" asked Owen, and Tosh nodded. Owen shrugged. "Then I'll stand by with a hypodermic of epinephrine and the paddles in case they get zapped."

"Zapped," murmured Ianto. "Is that a medical term?"

"It's a Torchwood term," said Owen, grinning at him. "Now, are we going to do this or not? I hate to say it, but I'm sort of sick of tea boy's sass coming out of Jack's mouth. It doesn't sound right."

Jack gave Ianto a raised eyebrow. "I think that's as close to a compliment you'll ever get from Owen, Ianto. We probably shouldn't make him suffer much longer."

Ianto narrowed his eyes at Owen and murmured "Instant," in a low voice. Owen rolled his eyes, and Jack laughed.

"How do we do this, Tosh?" he asked.

She put on her glasses and swiveled toward her monitor. "When you first found it, Ianto took it from the dead alien in the alley. Go ahead and pick it up, Ianto."

Ianto did as he was told, holding onto it for several seconds before Tosh nodded. "All right, toss it to Jack, since he touched it next."

Jack caught the alien knot in his uninjured hand and held onto it for several seconds as well. He noticed Ianto watching him and offered a reassuring smile.

"Now set it down, Jack," said Tosh. He did as he was told and stepped away. Tosh ran some wires from the car battery to the device, making sure not to touch it, then took a deep breath. "It should have you both imprinted now. Here goes."

She flipped a switch, and Jack could hear the hum of current run from the battery to the device. For a few moments it did nothing. Then it opened, the knots untangling as it lit up and spun around. Tosh looked exited, since this was apparently what was supposed to happen. Yet it didn't stop…it just kept going and going, and Tosh began to frown.

"Do you feel anything?" she asked, checking her monitors. Jack glanced at Ianto, who in response offered the tiniest shake of his head. When she didn't get an answer from either of them, she began typing quickly at her keyboard. The knot spun faster, and suddenly Ianto gasped and doubled over, clutching his stomach. Jack reached toward him, before he too felt a sudden sharp spasm, like something was ripping him apart from inside, somehow separating him from his body. Ianto fell to the floor next to him, and Jack quickly followed, the piercing sensation overwhelming him completely. It was nothing like what he had felt in the shower when they had first swapped bodies.

This time Jack felt excruciating pain ripping thru every cell of his body, and he knew he was seizing where he lay on the ground, though he could do nothing to stop it and just closed his eyes against agony while trying to shut out lights that were too bright and sounds that were too loud. It had not felt like this the first time they had switched; then it had been more of a quick tug in his gut, followed by a strange sensation of floating, and finally the disorientation of finding himself in an unfamiliar body.

This was far worse: this was killing him.

The transfer wasn't working. Maybe they had waited too long; maybe Tosh had got something wrong. Either way, he knew he was dying, and all he could do was pray to every deity he knew of that Ianto was somehow surviving. He couldn't feel his—or Ianto's —body any more. He was now in the dark place he hated so much, at least at times like this when he was desperate get back. Often he greeted the darkness as a release, a relief, however temporary, from whatever hell he had left behind; too often he longed to stay. This time he had to get back, had to know if Ianto had survived, because if he hadn't, Jack didn't know what he would do.

As he waited for the familiar pull back to life, he saw a light far before him. He had never, not once, seen that light before. Always it was darkness, all around him. He sensed the light was warm, comforting, hopeful. He wanted to go to the light, felt it beckoning to him, inviting him to walk through—

No. He needed to see Ianto first. He could not leave him, not now, not after everything they had been through. He tried to resist the pull of the light, but it was so hard. It sang to him, promised him an end to his suffering, to the eternal cycle of life and death he had endured for so long. But then he heard another voice calling his name, Welsh accent fuzzy in the darkness. His name—Ianto's voice. Jack tried to call back, but there was no answer. He began to move toward the light, though he wasn't sure if he was getting any closer; yet maybe Ianto was there, maybe he was waiting, so Jack had to try. Suddenly and without warning, he found himself yanked away, the agonizing pull in his gut forcing him away from the light, back into the darkness, through the blazing pain, until he surged to life with Ianto's name on his lips.

He woke gasping on the floor of the medical bay, but it was not Ianto holding him as it had been so many times before, it was Gwen. She looked pale and upset as she helped him sit, murmuring words he couldn't hear let alone understand, before trying to hold him up as he struggled to stand. He pushed her away and stumbled to where Owen was standing over the autopsy table, working furiously on Ianto and swearing copiously, even for Owen. Out of the corner of his eye, Jack saw Tosh standing by the stairs, looking shocked. Tahlia Blake had an arm around her shoulder and was trying to comfort her.

"What happened?" Jack demanded, staggering up to the table. It was strange to be moving in his own body again, to hear the timbre and cadence of his own voice. "Tell me what's wrong, Owen. And then tell me you can damn well fix it."

Owen pushed him out of the way. "You died. Both of you." He took a deep breath as he hurried to the other side of the table. "We knew you'd come back, but Ianto's not responding." Without another word, Owen hopped up on the table and straddled Ianto, where he began to give the Welshman chest compressions. He spoke haltingly in between pressing down on Ianto's chest and forcing air into his mouth. "I've already tried the defibrillator—best chance now is the old fashioned way. I don't know why he's not responding."

"I killed him," whispered Tosh, and she stared at Jack with tears in her eyes. "Jack, I don't know what happened. It should have worked—it was working—but then there was an energy surge that just appeared out of nowhere and…and you both…" She couldn't go on. Jack wanted to go to her, but right then all he could think about was Ianto lying on the table before him, fighting for his life.

"Fucking energy surge stopped your hearts. We got you both down here as quick as we could and figured he needed more help than you, but it's been ten minutes, Jack." Owen looked at him with dark eyes, his mouth set in a thin line. "I'm not sure what else I can do."

"No," Jack said, refusing to believe it was over. "Keep going. Don't you dare stop."

Gwen stepped up to him again, but he shook her off. "Jack—" she started.

"I'm not losing him," Jack whispered, brushing Ianto's hair off his face as Owen continued the chest compressions. "Not yet. Please Owen," he said, glancing into Owen's face as he leaned down over Ianto. "Not yet."

Owen nodded tightly and continued the chest compressions. He tried the defibrillator again. He stuck a needle into Ianto's chest. Nothing brought him back.

Jack felt his heart break inside him and held on to the table so that he didn't collapse again.

After another ten minutes, Owen finally sat back and let his head fall. "I'm sorry, Jack," he rasped, his voice broken. "There's nothing else I can do. He's gone." He practically fell off the table, obviously exhausted and upset.

Jack was only half aware of Tosh sobbing behind him. He just stared at Ianto's still, lifeless body. His primal instinct was to smack the pale face before him, to shake the slack shoulders and scream at Ianto to wake up, that they were better now. Yet he found he had no energy to be angry—no will, nothing, only a dead emptiness inside. He knew shock was setting in; this was, by far, the worst loss he had suffered in years. Yet he needed to don the mask of leadership for just a few moments more, and then he could break.

"You did your best," he finally managed, feeling salty tears on his lips as he spoke. "You all did." He stood and placed a hand on Owen's shoulder, giving him a simple nod as Owen wiped an arm across his eyes. Then he took a deep breath and walked over to where Tosh was still enveloped in Tahlia's arms. Gently he took the Asian woman into his own embrace, stroking her back as she cried into his chest, and he let his own tears fall with hers.

"It's not your fault," he whispered, kissing her hair.

"I killed him," she sobbed. Jack glanced into Tahlia's eyes and saw that they were bright with tears as well, and she hadn't even known Ianto for that long.

Taking Tosh's face in his hands, he brushed her tears away. "No, you didn't. The EED killed him. It wasn't your fault, Tosh. I don't blame you. Please believe me." She closed her eyes, but did not nod in agreement. Jack carefully guided her back to Tahlia, oddly grateful for the other woman's presence because that was all he could give Tosh at that moment.

"You all need some rest." He turned around, to where Gwen was quietly leaning against Owen's shoulder, tears streaming down her face. "You too, both of you. I want to stay with him for a while."

"Jack—" started Owen, but Jack waved him off.

"I need to be alone with him, Owen. Please."

They all nodded and headed up the stairs, Gwen stopping to embrace him tightly. Jack watched them go, the calm façade he had forced himself to wear slowly giving way to the deep anger and devastation he truly felt. He clenched his fists until they were gone, and he could hear them far from the medical bay. And then he let his fury loose.

He kicked at the chairs and knocked over every tray he could find. He threw anything worth throwing across the small room, relishing in the smashing of wood, glass, and metal, in the complete destruction of everything that had failed to save Ianto. He screamed and shouted and didn't care if anyone heard him, because he knew they would leave him alone. He needed this, he needed to let go of the rage before he could grieve. Ianto was dead.  _Gone_. After all they had learned and shared with one another over the course of one short week, they would never have a chance to live with it, to have that amazing life that Jack had promised him.

Finally he was out of breath and felt the adrenaline rush begin to ebb, leaving him exhausted and heartbroken. He carefully took Ianto's body down from the table and carried him to a far corner where nothing had been destroyed and no one would see them. Jack slid down the wall, cradling Ianto carefully, then placed him gently on the floor between his legs. He held the man tightly against him, arms wrapped around the still chest, just as Ianto had held him so many times. Kissing Ianto's hair, Jack let his tears fall once more, his chest heaving with the great gasping sobs that he could no longer control.

Ianto Jones was dead, and once more Jack had outlived someone he loved.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> *ducks and runs*  
> Oh, wait. There are still several chapters left. Thank goodness.  
> Thoughts? Comments? Writers live for them, you know. Thanks for reading!


	11. The Realization

Ianto was surrounded by the darkness he'd experienced after death for the third time in a week. He knew he had died, but this time he wasn't sure if he would come back. In their attempt to switch bodies, something had obviously gone wrong. The question was: had it gone wrong while he was in Jack's body, thereby almost guaranteeing he'd survive, or had it gone wrong after he had returned to his own body? Was he truly dead now?

And more importantly, where was Jack? Was he alive in his own body, or dead in Ianto's?

"Jack?" he called, unable to stop himself from shouting into the darkness. He remembered Jack falling next to him. If Jack had died as well, even temporarily, Ianto wondered if Jack was in the same place. Perhaps he would hear Ianto calling for him, and maybe they could be together one last time before one of them moved on. Because it seemed obvious to Ianto that one of them was going to die—whichever one of them was tied to Ianto's mortal body—and that death would be forever this time.

He called out again before he noticed the same light he had seen both times he had died in Jack's body. Reluctantly, he began to move toward it, drawn forward almost against his will, until he realized that he was actually getting closer this time. This was it, then: he was the one who was mortal once more. He suspected he could walk through the light now, if he chose, but he did not want to go, not yet. He was not ready: it was too soon. Yes, he was fated to live a short life with Torchwood; he had always known that. Yet somehow he also knew that now was not his time. He'd been through too much with Jack to leave him now, not without trying to survive. And to die now would be meaningless; when he did face death, he wanted it to have purpose and worth. He wanted to die fighting, not because of an accident with alien technology.

And so Ianto stopped. He closed his eyes against the temptation of the light and imagined his body instead: the feel of blood moving through his veins, the sound of air rushing into his lungs, the touch of clothing—of Jack—against his skin.

He concentrated until he could feel it as if it was real, but with it came pain: muscles stretching, bones repairing, skin knitting back together. It was almost so unbearable he screamed; when he had been shot it had been nothing like this, he hadn't  _felt_  it, not like he felt it now. He desperately wanted to open his eyes and search out the light, accept it for what it was and walk through if it would end the agonizing pain. Yet he could not give in, not yet. He would stay and he would survive, for Jack—somehow, someway, even though he had no idea whether Jack was even alive.

Soon the pain began to diminish, and Ianto felt a new sensation surrounding him, body and soul: warmth. There was also something prickling against his skin, a salty wetness he recognized but couldn't put words to yet. Slowly he became aware of his heart actually beating: not just an imagined heartbeat, but a real pulse pushing real blood through a real body. And with that realization Ianto tried to fill his lungs with air, bringing it in slowly and letting it out silently before filling up again, rejoicing in the simple act of breathing, of being alive.

It was not the dramatic gasp of life he was used to with Jack and had even experienced himself. This was a gradual return to living—at least, that's what he assumed was happening, what he hoped was the case. It was slow and calm. It was a release from pain, a relief from sorrow, a reprieve from the darkness. Ianto smiled, and then finally opened his eyes.

He was lying in a corner of the medical bay between Jack's legs, his body flush against Jack's chest. Strong arms were wrapped tightly around him, and Jack's head was leaning against Ianto's. The salty wetness Ianto had felt against his face were Jack's tears, falling freely as his shoulders shook with silent sobs.

Jack thought Ianto was dead.

Ianto closed his eyes and smiled again.

"Jack?" he murmured, and Jack tensed, still as a statue except the rise and fall of his chest, his breathing suddenly increasing as if he were trying to swallow hope itself.

"Jack," Ianto repeated. "You're crushing me."

This time Jack gasped, his arms unlocking themselves from around Ianto's chest to land on his shoulders, turning his upper body around so fast that Ianto thought he'd get whiplash. Jack's face was red and tear-stained—Ianto couldn't remember the man before him ever looking so ragged—but his eyes were bright and wide with shock.

"Ianto?" he murmured, one hand ghosting up to brush tentative fingers along Ianto's jaw, across his cheeks, over his lips and down his throat. "I thought you were—"

Ianto caught Jack's fingers as they moved toward his chest and held them there with his good hand. "I was," he said. "I didn't know if the switch worked."

"I was too," whispered Jack. "But then I came back, and you were gone…Ianto, you were…" The look in Jack's eyes was so indescribably grief-stricken that Ianto couldn't bear to meet the man's gaze. So he turned completely, kneeling before Jack, and pulled the other man into an embrace, offering comfort because it he needed it himself at that moment. Jack laid his head on Ianto's shoulder, breathing deeply as if to both settle his nerves and reassure himself that Ianto was really, truly alive as he wrapped his arms around Ianto's waist.

Finally Jack sat up, though he kept Ianto close. "But how?" he asked. "It's been almost an hour. Owen tried everything, until there was nothing else he could do."

For the first time, Ianto considered what had happened. He had been so grateful to leave the darkness, with its temptation of light and peace, and to find himself back in his own body, in Jack's arms, that he hadn't even thought about how it was possible. Because he wasn't in Jack's body anymore, so he wasn't immortal. Whatever had happened had killed them both…and yet somehow they had both come back.

He felt a chill run through his body at the implications, and his mind started racing in directions he wasn't prepared to follow. He stared past Jack, remembering the darkness and his determination to stay away from the light. He remembered concentrating on his body and feeling the agonizing pain, so different than the other two resurrections he had experienced. Pulling away, Ianto stood abruptly and turned his back on Jack, trying to bring order to his confused thoughts.

"Ianto?" asked Jack, scrambling to his feet as well and reaching out toward him. "What is it? What's wrong?"

Ianto walked away, only to find that his knee was fine. There was no swelling, no limp. He touched his side, where the alien had broken a rib, and pulled up his shirt: no pain, no bruise. And then he searched frantically for something sharp—scissors or a scalpel—until he found one lying on the floor and grabbed it. He frantically ripped at the wrap on his wrist, ignoring Jack's protests and questions.

Ianto's wrist was completely healed. He dropped the wrap and scalpel to the floor and turned to Jack, eyes wide and jaw slack as he held up his arm between them. There wasn't even a mark on the skin.

Jack had clearly figured it out and the look on his face was a combination of so many emotions that Ianto had to look away again before he was overwhelmed by Jack's feelings, let alone his own. He staggered to the stairs and collapsed, letting his head fall into his hands, swearing softly under his breath.

"Owen!" bellowed Jack, unmoving in the middle of the medical bay. "Get down here!"

He walked slowly over to Ianto, avoiding the furious destruction scattered throughout bay, and kneeled before him.

"Ianto?" he asked hesitantly. "Talk to me?"

Ianto brought his head up and glanced around the small area, littered with Owen's medical gear, broken glass, tipped over chairs and stools. He said the first thing that came to mind in the midst of the maelstrom that were his rapidly shifting thoughts. "Owen is going to be pissed."

Jack laughed nervously in response to the non sequitur. "Yeah, well I was…and you were…" He trailed off and shrugged, running through his hair. "I'll clean it up. Just talk to me."

"Damn right you will, Harkness," snapped Owen before Ianto could answer. "What did you—" He stopped when he saw Ianto sitting on the stairs. "Bloody hell."

Jack dropped his hand and turned to Owen. "Something happened," he said.

"Obviously," said Owen, still staring at Ianto. "You were dead."

"I know," Ianto said tiredly. "I remember."

"Do you remember what happened?"

Ianto was silent; he really didn't want to think about it again. "Yes, but I don't know how it happened," he finally replied. "Jack said I was out for an hour."

Owen had recovered and was scrambling around the destroyed medical bay until he found one of his scanners. He stepped over to Ianto and began to run it over him. "You were. I did everything I could—CPR, shock, even stuck a needle into your heart, and that is not something I want to do again. You were definitely dead, mate."

"I know, I felt it," Ianto grated out. "Why am I back then?"

Jack was gazing down at Ianto with an inscrutable expression, though Ianto thought that maybe, just maybe, he saw hope there and wished he didn't. "Owen?"

"I don't know," snapped the doctor. "I'm not picking up any unusual readings. Everything looks normal, although I'd have to compare it to your last baseline physical. The strangest thing is that all your injuries are healed." He put down the scanner and glanced up at Ianto, an awed yet apprehensive look on his face. "Like Jack."

"Shit," said Ianto, and he abruptly turned and ran up the stairs as Owen voiced his unspoken fear. He felt like he was going to have a panic attack. He needed to get out of there, get away from them, even Jack, and try to grasp what had happened. He dimly heard Jack and Owen calling out after him, but ignored them as he rushed toward the cog door.

"Ianto?" called Tosh in surprise, and he was vaguely aware of her and Gwen moving toward him in shock. He heard Jack tell them to back off as he hurried up the stairs and into the tourist office, instinctively looking for his coat, though it was downstairs in the Hub. Grabbing something else from the desk that caught his eye, he burst through the door onto the quay, walking quickly away from the office, from Torchwood, from whatever had happened to him—from what he didn't want to acknowledge.

He had died. He had come back. He had healed.  _Like Jack,_  Owen had said. Was he like Jack? Was he…god, he didn't want to think about it, let alone say it. It wasn't possible. It wasn't possible because  _Jack_  was wasn't possible. He had said so himself, therefore Ianto could not be like Jack.

He heard the tourist door slam shut behind him but kept walking. Someone had followed him, probably Jack if he had got over his own shock. Ianto wasn't ready to talk to him; he needed to wrap his own brain around the meaning of it first. Was he immortal? Did he want to be immortal?

It had been just hours ago that was he had told Jack it would be all right if the switch didn't work, that he could handle living in Jack's body if it meant Jack had a chance at a normal, mortal life after all he had been through. Now Ianto was facing the very real possibility that even though he was back in his own body, he might have taken a bit of Jack's immortality with him. And that was so very different than knowing he might have spared Jack the pain of living forever. This was the possibility of  _him_ living forever in his own body, while Jack still suffered in his.

And yet…he could be with Jack then, couldn't he? Jack wouldn't be alone, and neither would Ianto. They would have each other…if they wanted one another, forever until the end of the universe. And it was that thought— _forever until_   _the end of the universe—_ that sent him over the edge, so that he stopped, turned around several times until he found a place to collapse, and sat heavily on the boardwalk with his back to the wall, completely overwhelmed and on the verge of hyperventilating as his head fell between his knees.

Gentle hands tilted his chin up, forced him to focus, but Ianto shut his eyes against the brilliant blue gaze that tried to capture his. "Breathe," Jack said softly. "Ianto, breathe. And look at me. Please."

Ianto did the first, the steady calm of Jack's voice bringing him back to the present, to his training, to what he knew perfectly well he needed to do to avoid passing out: he pursed his lips, breathing in through his nose on a slow count of five and out through his mouth. Soon enough he felt his breathing return to normal, the crushing pain in his chest beginning to relax. He opened his eyes to find Jack watching him with deep concern.

"I'm all right," Ianto said, forcing himself back up the wall, letting it support him since he wasn't quite sure he could stand on his own.

"No, you're not," said Jack. "And trust me, I get it." He gave Ianto one of his half-grins, the self-deprecating one the others rarely saw.

"I'm sorry," Ianto murmured, running a hand through his hair. "I didn't mean to run out like that."

"Why not?" asked Jack, and he leaned against the wall next to him, shoulder to shoulder. "That's what I did the first time. I ran like hell." He paused, staring out across the water. "I ran and ran and ran. Sometimes I feel like I'm still running."

Ianto was silent, because that was exactly what he wanted to do: run as far as he could. As if Jack sensed it, he reached for Ianto's hand and held it tight. "But maybe I don't have to run anymore," Jack whispered. "And neither do you."

Ianto dropped his hand and stepped forward on weak knees, the panic suddenly rising in his gut once more. He waved his hands at Jack and started unsteadily down the boardwalk again. He didn't need that kind of pressure, not now, not when it hardly seemed possible, let alone actually happening.

"Jack, don't say that, please," he threw over his shoulder, sensing rather than seeing Jack behind him. "You don't even know what happened. I don't know what happened. It could have been anything, some sort of freak accident with the Rift for all we know."

Jack pulled him to a stop. "Ianto. We don't know what it was, but we know what it could be. We can't ignore that."

"Yes, we can!" Ianto snapped. "Because it's not possible. You've said so yourself. You're different, you're impossible. I can't be like you. I can't."  _I don't know if I want to. I don't know if I can survive it,_  he added silently to himself. His thoughts must have played out on his face, because Jack nodded as if he understood.

"I'm sorry. I know it's hard. We don't have to go there right now. But we should go back inside, let Owen run some tests." He put his hands on Ianto's shoulders. "You died. And you came back. We need to know what happened."

"I don't want to know anything," Ianto hissed, walking away again. And yet, he did want to know—he  _needed_  to know, or he would run and run, and he might never stop. He stuffed his hands into his pockets and felt the object he had grabbed from the tourist office. Fingering it lightly, he wondered if he dared.

"I want to know," Jack said softly, standing before him. "Ianto, please. Come back. Don't run away. I can help you."

Ianto suddenly knew what to do. He ran a finger over the object in his pocket, closed his eyes, and turned toward Jack with a sad smile. "Then don't stop me," he whispered, pulling the letter opener from his coat. Jack's eyes went wide.

"No!" he said, shaking his head and moving closer. Ianto motioned him back. "Ianto, don't. You don't know for sure. You could die."

Ianto glanced at the opener in his hands. Jack was right: if he was wrong, he could end up killing himself, and he was definitely not ready for that sort of inglorious end. Plus he really couldn't stomach the thought of plunging a letter opener into his belly. Instead he held out his left hand before him. Capturing Jack's eyes with his own, Ianto held the other man's gaze as he slowly drew the dull blade across his palm, pressing hard as he cut long and deep, hissing with pain as it carved a thin line in his skin that began to bleed immediately.

"How long?" Ianto asked, squeezing his hand around the cut, watching as his blood fell in droplets to the boardwalk. "How long, Jack?"

Jack just stared Ianto's hand, at the blood falling to the ground, until he finally met Ianto's eyes with a stricken look. "Minutes, usually. Five minutes at most."

"Five minutes it is, then," Ianto replied. He searched for someplace to sit and made his way toward a nearby bench, where he sat down and opened his hand. It was covered in slick blood and hurt like hell. He wished he had his stopwatch.

Jack, of course, came to sit next to him. "Why?" he asked softly, refusing to look at Ianto's fist.

"I can't pretend it didn't happen," said Ianto. "And I can't assume anything. I need to know, Jack. And so do you."

He glanced down at his hand but did not open it. He sighed deeply, suddenly unsure of his actions and how he wanted them to play out. If he healed, he would face an eternity of life and death, joy and pain, love and loss, endless years of watching the world go by. If he didn't heal, then he was mortal. He would likely never know how or why he'd come back, but he'd live his life as he had always expected: short and dangerous, the life of a Torchwood agent. Again he was faced with the realization that he had been willing to accept the former in payment for Jack's mortality, but could he accept immortality as a consequence on its own? Could he spend a lifetime with Jack?

Did Jack want to spend a lifetime with him?

The thought made him nauseous, and without warning, he leaned forward and was sick all over the boardwalk. Jack rubbed his back, murmuring mindless words of comfort that Ianto could barely hear, his own thoughts were so loud. What did he want? What would he be more upset to lose? His mortality, or the possibility of living forever?

Sitting up, he cleaned his mouth with his sleeve, then laid his fists in his lap, but Jack slowly reached over for his left hand. He gently pried Ianto's fingers open, slick blood running over both of them. Ianto couldn't look.

"You need to have it stitched up, I think," Jack said softly, and there was a note of heartbreak in his voice that made Ianto choke on a sob as he clutched his hand shut again and tried to block out the pain. "You're still bleeding quite badly."

Ianto reached up with his right hand and practically ripped off his tie. He awkwardly wrapped it around his palm, not caring that he was destroying it. He knew he wasn't ready to go back into the Hub, and if he was going to continue to bleed, he needed to start containing it. Jack helped him, tying it carefully for him, not too tight, kissing it softly when he was finished.

"I'm sorry," Jack whispered.

"No, I'm sorry," said Ianto, falling back against the bench. "You must hate me right now."

Jack looked at him with confusion. "Why would I hate you?"

Ianto raised an eyebrow. "Because I just had a panic attack thinking I might be like you."

"I don't blame you one bit," Jack said with a bitter chuckle. "I had several myself the first few times I died and came back."

"That's not what I meant," Ianto said softly. "It's not that I don't want to…to be with you, but the thought of being  _like_  you, the thought of forever is…" He trailed off, unable to articulate what he was feeling about such an enormous responsibility.

"Is terrifying and exhilarating at the same time?" supplied Jack. "Because that's how I felt just now. Terrified for you, yet exhilarated at the same time."

"Oh Jack," Ianto whispered, willing himself not to let the tears fall at Jack's simple admission of hope amidst so much confusion. "I'm so sorry."

"Don't be," said Jack, though his tone sounded a bit forced. "Be glad. Be thankful. I told you before, I wouldn't wish it on anyone, even someone I could spend forever with."

Ianto let his eyes close as Jack's disappointment washed over him. There was a small part of Ianto that was disappointed as well, though it warred with relief within him at the same time. He was so confused he wasn't sure what he should be feeling. Instead, he glanced down at his hand, peeling back the tie that was now soaked through to glance at the cut once more.

It had not healed, and it had been far more than five minutes.

He was normal. He was back in his body, he was alive, and he was mortal…and he still wasn't sure how he felt about it all.

The coms went off then, interrupting the surreal moment of profound realization. "Jack, we've got trouble," said Owen. "We're on our way with the SUV."

Jack sighed and stood. He offered Ianto his hand, and he took it with his uninjured one, standing close for a long moment.

"I'm sorry," Jack murmured. "I never meant for any of this to happen."

A smile quirked at the edges of Ianto's lips. "I know. But I don't regret it, do you?"

Jack leaned forward to kiss him, quick and gentle, and Ianto sighed as they parted, because he knew exactly what Jack was going to say.

"Yes," Jack whispered. "Even though I shouldn't."

The SUV pulled up nearby then and they hurried toward it, hands entwined. Owen was hanging out the window calling for them, Gwen by his side in the passenger seat, Tosh in the back already clicking away at her PDA with Tahlia Blake. Everything looked perfectly normal…except Ianto knew everything would also be completely different now. He only hoped that he and Jack could find their way together after all they had been through.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter was tough. If you were hoping for more for Ianto, know that 90% of the time I'm a canon girl, although I have written a few stories where they did get their happy ending. And this one isn't finished yet. Thanks for reading!


	12. The Confrontation

Jack followed Ianto into the back of the SUV. Tosh leaned over the seat from behind them to hug Ianto tightly around the neck.

"I can't believe it," Tosh murmured. "Are you all right?"

"Getting there," Ianto replied, although Jack could see that the man was still clearly rattled. Who could blame him? Jack wasn't completely settled himself; he thought he had lost Ianto, had sat with his lover's dead body only to have him return to life so unexpectedly, so quietly…so hopefully. And yet that hope—did Ianto even share it?—had been lost soon after by the deep cut on Ianto's hand that did not heal. Jack hated himself for daring to think such a thing, knowing the price was too high for anyone to pay; yet he had wanted it, for just a moment, and now he would have to move on, as hard as it might be.

"You scared us, mate," said Owen from the driver's seat. "Most normal people don't gasp back to life after being legally dead for an hour."

"It's Torchwood," said Ianto, letting his head fall back. "And I didn't gasp."

"I'll want to run some tests, you know," Owen continued, and Ianto closed his eyes. Jack took Ianto's good hand in his own and squeezed it in support.

"It's not what you think," Ianto told Owen softly, but he did not say anything more.

Tahlia was watching Ianto closely, an odd look on her face that Jack couldn't quite read. "Nice to see you again, Ianto Jones," she said and gave him a quick kiss on the cheek. He inclined his head toward her and gave her a slightly confused look. Jack noticed the odd turn of phrase and was about to say something, but she merely raised an eyebrow to silence him.

"Are you really all right or are you just saying so?" she asked softly. Ianto seemed to think about it.

"Both?" he finally suggested, and she nodded, offering him a sad smile. Jack coughed to interrupt whatever moment they seemed to be having, but no one appeared to hear him. Tahlia had liked Ianto in Jack's body; he wasn't sure what might happen now that Ianto was back in his own. She seemed to be studying the Welshman more thoughtfully than usual.

"You'd have made a good Time Agent," she murmured enigmatically, laying a hand on his shoulder and running her fingers over it almost subconsciously. "You'll figure it out. It's all set when you do."

"Figure what out?" asked Jack, and she turned toward the window with a sly smile on her face, hand protectively covering the wrist strap he hadn't noticed until now. He frowned at it, wondering what was going on, but she just shook her head at him, as if warning him off.

"Owen, where's the medical kit?" Jack asked, finally breaking the lingering silence in the car.

"Who's hurt?" asked Owen without answering the question.

"I stubbed my toe," Jack snapped. "Where is it?"

"Under the seat," Owen replied. "Not that you ever sit back there enough to know."

"I like to drive."

"Well, I'm the one who happens to know where we're going, so this time I get to drive."

"Speaking of which," said Ianto as Jack rummaged around under the seat for the kit. "Where are we going? What's happened?"

"They've come for it," said Tosh, clicking away on her computer. "They've demanded we meet them and return it."

"Yeah, we had a hell of a long distance phone call from outer space, Jack," said Owen from up front, his voice dripping with sarcasm. Jack found the kit and pulled out some antiseptic, bandages, and a hypodermic needle. As if sensing Jack was playing with his toys, Owen glanced over the seat.

"What do you need the needle for?" he demanded.

"Pain killer," said Jack, ripping open the bandages.

"For your toe? I don't think so."

"It's not for me," Jack snapped, undoing the bloody tie around Ianto's hand. He grimaced at the deep cut, still red and raw. "This will sting," he murmured to Ianto. The only response was a sharp inhale as Jack cleaned the wound; it probably hurt like hell.

"Wait, Ianto's hurt?" Gwen finally chimed in, turning around. "But I thought he—"

"Nope," said Ianto, holding up his palm for them to see. "The proof of the pudding is in the eating."

His dry delivery did not alleviate any awkwardness: the car fell silent again, as if no one knew what to say, but as was often the case in such situations, Gwen spoke first. "Ianto, I'm sorry. Are you all right?"

"It hurts," he replied. "Might need stitches. But I won't lose my hand."

"That's not what I meant," she said softly, eyes filled with sympathy as she gazed back at them. Ianto gave her a half smile.

"I know. And yes, I'll be fine. Thank you. Now just tell us where we're going and who called us to this interstellar meeting."

"Not sure," said Owen. "Tosh, fill 'em in. Jack, clean it and wrap it. I'll stitch him up later. One shot in the fleshy part of his palm should help the pain but let him still use the hand."

Jack did as directed and listened as Tosh talked.

"Almost as soon as you left, we had an incoming message demanding that we bring the device to Victoria Park. We thought about sending Tahlia off with it immediately, only that's where her ship is cloaked—"

"I still could," interrupted Tahlia. "I'm happy to take it off your hands and make a run for it with the manipulator, transport back to my ship. Might avoid all sorts of unpleasant things."

Once more Jack gave her a questioning look that she ignored. "They'd be after you in a heartbeat if they suspected anything, which they certainly would. You wouldn't have a chance."

"I still might not," she murmured, pulling a rueful face. "But they'll keep coming after you lot if you keep it much longer."

"Not if we send them a message," said Jack. "We make it clear that it's gone and that we won't stand for any more bounty hunters coming around to look for it. And we make sure they know exactly who it's been turned over to."

"That was sort of what we were thinking," started Tosh, but Owen interrupted her.

"Only we couldn't figure out how the hell to actually do that without getting anyone killed."

Everyone was quiet once again.

"Do we know what we're dealing with yet?" asked Jack.

Tosh spoke up from the back. "I'm picking up multiple non-human life forms in a clearing at the park. At least a dozen."

"And there are six of us," said Owen. "Brilliant."

"We just tell it like it is and stand our ground," said Jack. "And hope there are no guns."

"Bluff our way out, you mean," muttered Owen. Jack ignored him.

"Oh, they'll have guns," said Tahlia. "Energy weapons, I'd guess. Probably projectiles, too."

"How do you know?" Jack asked suspiciously, and she just shrugged.

She was hiding something, he knew it now, but before he could push it, Ianto spoke up.

"We could try the old switch-off," he offered. "Offer them the real device, but give them the one Tahlia brought back for Tosh to study. Could buy us time."

"Like we didn't think of that," said Owen from the front. Ianto rolled his eyes and ignored him just as Jack had.

"Did you bring the second one?" Ianto asked Tosh, and she nodded from behind them.

"I did, just in case. And it's fairly close to the one we originally recovered. Unless they are really looking for specifics at that moment, it could buy us that time."

"Time for what?" asked Gwen. "If they leave, what do we need time for? We go back to the Hub, give Tahlia the real weapon, and she can take it to wherever this Shadow Proclamation is."

"They'll figure it out eventually," said Tosh. "They'll come back once they realize it's not the one they wanted."

"Or they'll go after her," added Jack. "So we're buying her time to get there, turn it in, and claim amnesty."

Tahlia turned sharply at that last. "I didn't think of that."

"Of what?" asked Ianto.

"Amnesty." She shook her head as if in a daze. "Damn. There goes life as a bounty hunter."

"You did come all the way here to find it and turn it in," Ianto said gently, his hand on her knee. "The possibility for weaponized use of that device is a significant threat to the galaxy. Trust me, I know. I survived it."

There was an inelegant snort from the front of the car.

"Tahlia, is there something you're not telling us?" Jack asked softly, leaning across Ianto so he could reach out to her. She seemed quieter than usual, as if something were on her mind. Tahlia had once been a Time Agent; did she know something they didn't about what was going to happen that night?

"No, Jack," she said, a spark of her normal personality asserting itself, however forced. "I'm not keeping secrets. At least, not yet." She winked and turned away again. Jack shook his head in frustration.

"Then that's what we do. We meet them, offer them the second device, and hope they take it and leave without much resistance. As soon as they do, we give Tahlia the original and send her off with best wishes for a speedy trip."

"I've brought it with me," she murmured, and the tension in the car rose unexpectedly. Ianto looked back and forth between her and Jack.

"Why?" asked Jack, sounding remarkably calm, even though he didn't feel that way. Something was going on, and he hated not knowing what it was.

"Seemed prudent. Quicker get away."

"And why would you need to get away quickly?" asked Owen from the front seat, voicing exactly what Jack was thinking.

"You never know with these sorts of things," she shrugged.

"Or if you're a former Time Agent, sometimes you do," said Jack. "Tell us what you know."

Tahlia's gaze flickered between him and Ianto. "I don't know anything, honestly. It's just a gut feeling. Be careful. It might not go down as planned."

"If Tahlia has the weapon, why not send her now?" asked Tosh. "Why wait? We could distract the aliens to give her that time to get away."

"They'll suspect something," Jack said, shaking his head.

"It's also our last card—what if we have to play it?" Ianto murmured. "We still need it, just in case something goes wrong."

"Exactly," said Tahlia in agreement. "Which is another reason I brought it. As long as everything goes smoothly, I'll leave you to your alien hunting and take off as soon as it's clear."

"If we stick to the plan, nothing should go wrong," Jack said. "Or more wrong than usual." He heard the stubbornness in his voice, as well as his use of the word "should." In reality, Tahlia was right: things rarely went as planned in Torchwood, so being prepared for any possibility was probably a good thing.

Still, his eyes found their way to her wrist strap, and he idly let his own fingers curl over the similar one on his arm. Hers was much slimmer, sleeker. She could pull a sleeve over it and it would hardly be noticeable, which was probably why he hadn't seen it before. That or she hadn't been wearing it, which was odd, given that hers was in much better working condition than his: she could still teleport and time travel. The Doctor had ensured that Jack no longer had that capability.

With a sigh he pulled his eyes away and watched as Owen pulled into the park and stopped the SUV a ways back from what appeared to be a long line of trees.

"Looks like they're on the other side of those trees," said Tosh, eyeing the scene skeptically. "Certainly not the most advantageous meeting place on our part."

"Walking into a dark forest full of aliens?" said Owen. "Nah, it's right up our alley. Couldn't think of a better way to spend my night."

The sarcasm was obvious in his voice, but Gwen shot him an annoyed look anyway.

"What about my ship?" asked Tahlia suddenly. "Any sign of it?"

Tosh was quiet for a moment before looking up in surprise. "I'm not picking it up anymore. It's gone."

"Or destroyed," Tahlia sighed. "Damn, I liked that ship."

"And we've hit our first roadblock," Owen said from the front, earning another reprimand from Gwen.

"I'm sorry about your ship," Ianto said, and she shrugged.

"So you said. But I've still got this." She held up her manipulator. "It'll work out."

"Know that for sure?" Ianto murmured, as if he too had picked up on the same thing Jack had been wondering: what did Tahlia know?

Pushing his thoughts aside, Jack took a deep breath to concentrate on the moment. "All right, everyone's armed, right?" There were nods around the car. Tosh handed Jack and Ianto more weapons from the back, as well as the second EED that Tahlia had found for her to study. "All right, then just follow my lead. We're going to be as diplomatic as possible about this."

He could almost feel Ianto frowning beside him. "And you're going to do the talking?"

"I can be diplomatic," Jack replied defensively.

"But you don't really like to," Ianto replied.

"No, I don't," Jack agreed, trying to hold back a grin. "But we need to get them off our planet and get rid of this device, so I'll do my best."

"By talking," said Ianto, his voice dry and skeptical.

"And I officially declare Ianto Jones fit for duty," said Owen from the front seat, this time earning a smile from Gwen and even a giggle from Tosh. Jack rolled his eyes, but Ianto gazed at him with an unasked question in eyes laced with worry; Jack nodded in response.

"I'll be careful. Let's go."

They stepped out into the night, Tosh guiding them toward the alien gathering—or trap, depending on how one viewed it. They slowed as they approached the line of trees and drew their weapons quietly, holding them securely but non-threateningly. Jack placed the body-swapping device—the original one, not the weapon—in his coat pocket and kept his Webley holstered.

As they passed through the trees, they came across a dozen aliens, a mix of energy and projectile weapons in hand, just as Tahlia had said. Most were Mixolydians, which either meant they were the most zealous of the bounty hunters after it, or the weapon was theirs in the first place. A few of the mysterious green aliens complimented the gathering, obviously working together with the Mixolydians.

There was a long silence during which no one spoke. Jack felt Ianto by his side and tried to push down his fear for the man who was now mortal and yet still risking his life. Strangely enough, Tahlia stood almost protectively on the other side of Ianto. The others had spread out behind them, all on high alert. He decided it was finally time to start talking.

"Captain Jack Harkness," he called, putting as much confidence as he could into his voice when really, he had no idea how this would go down. They'd had two bad run-ins with this race already. "Torchwood. We've got what you want. In return, we demand you leave this planet in peace."

One Mixolydian stepped forward, larger and more dominant than the others, the obvious leader. He snarled before speaking in that same damn accent the other two had used as well.

"You have killed two of my people, as well as several others." The alien grinned with a mouthful of teeth that Jack remembered too well from when they had ripped out Ianto's throat. "Therefore, you are in no position to make deals."

"I'm not making a deal, I'm making a demand." He took the EED from his pocket. "Take it and leave, or I will destroy your little toy before you even have a chance to use it."

Every alien pointed their weapon at Jack, and even he couldn't deny the sudden racing of his heart; his team raised theirs in response, though he still kept his Webley holstered. It vaguely occurred to him that he might have met a species ready to call his bluff, but then again, he had been a conman once. He could handle it.

"You will not destroy it, Captain Harkness," said the leader. "Because you know we would destroy you if you did."

"What's going to stop you destroying us anyway?" Jack demanded.

The alien blinked. "Nothing. Although we know this is a Level Five protected planet under the umbrella of the Shadow Proclamation. Therefore, we will not destroy you or your city if you return the stolen device and refrain from contacting them."

"Done," said Jack. "We have no way of contacting them anyway. Earth is years away from full alien contact."

"Then the device, Captain Harkness."

Jack took a deep breath and stepped forward, holding the EED out before him. A second alien stepped forward and grunted. "On the ground."

Jack set it down and began to step back when the second alien motioned with his gun. It bent over the device and began examining it. Jack held his breath; they must suspect something, and Jack hoped Tosh was right, that they could at least buy some time with the switch.

Apparently not.

The alien second shook his head and stepped beside its leader. The leader glanced from Jack to the device, then back to Jack. Without taking its eyes from Jack, it blew the device into pieces, then leveled its weapon and aimed it straight at Jack's chest. From the corner of his eye, Jack saw Ianto take a step forward, and his heart leapt into his throat. Even after all they had been through the past week, Ianto was still walking into danger for him. Jack could take the risk, could take the shot; Ianto couldn't. He would die, and Jack would be alone. Even though he now  _understood_ Ianto'sfear that one day Jack might not survive, the risk was still too great for the other man to try and protect Jack at the cost of his own life. He motioned Ianto back, but the stubborn man took another step forward to flank him, almost shoulder to shoulder, and Tahlia moved with him.

The others stepped forward as well, waiting to see how the scene played out. Jack watched the alien leader warily, hoping against hope this would end without any bloodshed, but doubting it with every second that passed. He wanted to speak, but knew that, at least, would be a mistake.

"You think that we are fools, Captain Harkness. You offer not we what seek, but what you hoped we would accept. You underestimate us."

Although Jack wanted to grin, he merely nodded, knowing respect was key to preserving his throat at that moment. His fingers itched toward his Webley, however. "We had to try," he offered as casually as he could.

"The device is of no use to you," the Mixolydian said. "Surrender it or you will die."

"We know it's a weapon," said Jack, "and we can't let you have it. We sent it away. It's light years from here by now. You underestimated us."

Behind him, Jack could almost feel his team collectively tense as one. The confrontation he had hoped to avoid was almost certainly about to happen, unless the Mixolydian believed him and simply packed ship and left. The cunning alien narrowed its eyes, and Jack knew it hadn't worked: it was going to call his bluff.

It opened fire straight at Jack.

One bolt of light caught him on the right shoulder (crap shot alien, thought Jack—no wonder it needed to steal people's bodies), hard enough to drop him to his knees. Before anyone could react, before even Jack could draw his own weapon, Ianto had moved forward, stepping in front of him with his weapon raised. Jack almost wanted to shoot the man for putting himself directly in the line of fire. Yet just as quickly, Tahlia Blake jumped in front of Ianto and took the next shot. And it hit her directly in the chest, so that she crumpled immediately to the ground.

Dead.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I love ending on these kinds of cliffhangers, sorry. Or not sorry. The next chapter is quite a bit longer, and hopefully you have some idea of where this is going if I've laid my cards right. Many thanks to darcy58 for his help! Thoughts? Comments? Thanks for reading!


	13. The Resolution

Ianto stared at the body of Tahlia Blake on the ground before him for less than a millisecond before his instincts kicked in over his shock, and he fired at the alien leader, catching him with three bullets to the chest. Behind him, he heard Jack step up and shout as he began unloading his Webley into the alien mob. And then Owen was next to them, and they were all firing madly at the aliens as they backed away, taking cover behind trees and bushes, whatever they could find. It was an alien firefight in the middle of the park, like something out of a bad science fiction gangster movie: yet another Torchwood plan gone horribly wrong.

Tosh took a hit to her leg and fell; this just made Jack even more angry, and he pulled a second gun from his coat pocket and started yelling as he fired. "Cover me!" shouted Owen, and Ianto did exactly that: he moved in front of Owen so that the doctor could get to Tosh, who was lying on the ground where Gwen had pulled her behind a large tree, her breathing quick, her face beaded with sweat. Owen began treating her while Ianto and Gwen returned to Jack's side.

They somehow made quick work of the confrontation until Jack was standing alone before them, his weapon pointed at the last alien left facing them, the second in command who had examined the device. The bastard had its own weapon drawn, a large ungainly gun that was clearly more than the energy blaster most of the others had been using. It was another standoff. Jack saw Ianto moving toward him and motioned him to stand back again; like hell he would. 

"You made a big mistake tonight," Jack said, his voice tight. "You could have walked away, but instead you are barely leaving with your life. Get back to your ship and get the hell off my planet. And tell your friends to stay away as well. This is over." 

The alien offered an ugly mouth full of teeth. "That is what you think, Jack Harkness." 

"That's what I know," Jack snarled. "Do it."

"Not without the device. You still have the real one." 

"It's gone," Jack ground out. "You're too late. Leave or you will die. You've done enough damage here." 

Ianto winced; that was probably pushing it. The alien grinned, and it was obvious that Jack had given it an opening.

"Oh, but that's where you're wrong," it said.

The barest flicker of yellow eyes toward Ianto told him what would happen next, and yet it still seemed to happen in slow motion. The alien shifted its weight and fired, just catching Ianto in the left shoulder as he tried to throw himself out of the way. Jack immediately shot it through the throat, yet before it fell, the alien turned its arm almost imperceptibly and got off one unexpected—and much cleaner—shot at Jack, the weapon blowing a hole the size of a fist in Jack's chest before the creature stumbled to the ground, gurgling its death rattle. 

It was almost as bad as the night they had first found the device, when Jack had been impaled. And just like that night, Ianto found himself standing and putting down the creature before him, emptying his magazine into its body until Gwen was there, calmly wrapping a hand around his arm and lowering his weapon. Ianto took a shaky breath and nodded, dropping his gun and putting a hand to his shoulder as he turned and went to kneel down before Jack. 

It would be a while. 

Ianto closed Jack's eyes and pulled the greatcoat around the gaping wound in Jack's chest. From the corner of his eye he saw a flash of light, but his mind was too numb to really care if any more aliens chose to attack them at that moment. Gwen had gone to check on Tahlia, and Ianto walked over, picking up his gun and pocketing it. There was no blood on the dead woman, perhaps because Tahlia had been shot by an energy blaster; the only other difference between her and Jack was that Tahlia would not wake up. 

"What do we do?" asked Gwen softly. "She was supposed to take the real one away, the weapon. We can't keep it here, or they'll just keep coming after it."

"It should to go to the Shadow Proclamation, just like she planned," said Ianto, frowning down at Tahlia. Something niggled at the back of his mind, something about all the strange things she had said in the SUV. 

"How do we get it there? We don't know where it is, we barely know _what_ it is." 

Ianto nodded. "Jack might know, though. And the Doctor certainly would." 

Gwen glanced up at him in surprise. "You'd let him swan off with the Doctor?" she asked, and Ianto gave her a harsher look than she probably deserved. 

"No one lets Jack do anything. He does what he wants." He let her absorb that before continuing. "And yes, to save the planet, I would. Wouldn't you?" 

Gwen looked down and nodded. "Of course. I'm sorry, Ianto. Do we just wait for Jack, then?" 

Glancing back at Jack, Ianto closed his eyes against the idea forming in his head. It was mad, completely mad. It went against every rule in the book, everything he had learned from Torchwood, Jack, and the Rift about messing with space-time. And yet…it seemed the most logical thing to do, somehow. Something was telling him that it was what he was supposed to do, as if he had already done it and was simply remembering to do it again.

Murmuring a silent apology to the woman before him, Ianto carefully slipped the vortex manipulator from her wrist and hurried over to where Owen was helping Tosh with her leg. When she saw him holding the manipulator, she shook her head. 

"Oh no," she said, biting her lip. "She isn't."

"I'm sorry, Tosh," Ianto said softly, brushing a hand across her cheek as he kneeled down before her. "But I need your help now. Do you have any idea how this works?" 

"What are you going to do?" Owen asked, but Ianto ignored him, focusing only on Tosh instead. "You're injured, you need medical treatment." 

"Not really," Tosh shrugged, frowning at Ianto's shoulder. He shrugged off her look of concern, though it was painful. "Jack's never let me look at his. It's from the future, obviously, and seems to do a bit of everything."

"It can be used as a transporter," Ianto said, and she nodded. "So do you think the last set of coordinates would be where she last transported from?" 

"Seems logical," said Tosh. "My guess would be her ship, though, and that's gone. And it's also capable of time travel, so you don't know when you would be transporting to, if she had jumped in time recently." 

"Right," said Ianto, his eyes glazing over as he considered it. "So I need to know where and when." Owen jumped in again.

"No, no way," he said. He tried to grab the strap from Ianto, but Ianto moved it quickly out of reach. "No. You can't do it. You're hurt."

"So give me another shot and a plaster. We need her," Ianto replied. "She's the only one who can get the bloody weapon off the planet."

"Destroy it," said Owen. "And take off your coat while we argue." Ianto glared at him, but reluctantly complied, seeing as his shoulder was starting to ache even more, and he knew there was still a lot to do. Owen began examining Ianto's injury; he hissed from the pain as the doctor cleaned it. "Like I said, just blow it to pieces," Owen continued. "That'll stop 'em." 

Ianto rolled his eyes; he felt as if he were explaining it to a child. "That won't accomplish anything except destroy the evidence and make them even more angry. Do you honestly think they won't come back with an entire fleet of ships if we just blow it up and say, 'Oops, sorry about that?'" 

"I thought we were a protected planet," Tosh offered, glancing between them. "Wouldn't we be protected if they tried to attack us?"

"Tosh, how many times have we saved the world?" Owen asked tiredly, laying gauze on Ianto's wound, taping it down, and then giving him another shot of painkiller before wrapping it. "All on our own?" 

"Point taken," she murmured. "So no expectations there."

"And from what Jack has said, the protection only applies if we are attacked without provocation," Ianto said. "No, we have to get it to the Shadow Proclamation on our own and as quickly as possible. They're like intergalactic police. They'll take care of it." He wasn't sure why he believed this so completely, but he did. He had to. 

"Then we take it ourselves," said Owen. "We've got the manipulator, we've got a ship, and we've got Jack. We can finally go into space."

While Ianto pulled on his coat and stared at Owen as if he were insane, Tosh and Gwen exchanged looks that clearly agreed; no one said anything. 

"This isn't Star Trek, Owen," Gwen finally snapped. "We don't know where it is, what do to do, nothing. Not to mention we don't know how the hell to fly a spaceship!"

"Jack does," Owen said stubbornly. "You know as well as I do he could do it."

"Tahlia's ship is gone," said Tosh. "Probably destroyed."

"We take theirs," said Owen. Ianto rolled his eyes. "Okay, then we let Jack do it with the wrist strap, then. It's a transport device. It could probably take him straight there, if it does interstellar distances."

"And if it doesn't?" murmured Tosh. 

There was a gasp followed by a groan behind them. "It does, but I don't know the coordinates," Jack murmured, obviously waking up. "Never actually been there. Tried to avoid them as a Time Agent, definitely avoided them after I left." 

Ianto glanced at the others and hurried over to Jack. He opened Jack's coat and saw that the wound to his chest was starting to heal, but hadn't closed completely. Jack wouldn't be going anywhere for a while, by spaceship or transporter.

"What about a ship?" Ianto asked. "Could you fly one?"

Jack had closed his eyes, but a small smile ghosted over his lips at the question. "'Course I could. Had one myself once. But that's not the answer either. We'd be blown out of the sky before we made it halfway across the galaxy given how badly they're after this thing." 

"Owen suggested destroying it," Ianto said softly. Jack shook his head and coughed. 

"You heard them, they'll never leave us alone if we do. The only thing we can do now that we're involved is get it to the Shadow Proclamation somehow. Best bet is the manipulator, which means we need the coordinates. It's located on a set of asteroids somewhere in the Omicron province." 

Ianto frowned. "Could we find them in the archives?" 

"Doubt it," said Jack with a sigh. He was clearly exhausted. "Maybe UNIT has them. Or maybe Martha can call the Doctor." Jack's speech was slurring, and Ianto knew he was about to slip into unconsciousness. He had some vague idea of who Martha was, but no way to contact her.

"That's not good enough, Jack. It would take too long, and Cardiff could be long gone by the time we figured it out. Tell me how the manipulator works." He lightly tapped Jack's face. "Come on, stay with me 'till I fix this, then sleep as long as you want. Jack? Wake up." He slapped a bit harder, and Jack swore. "The manipulator, Jack. I have an idea." 

Jack mumbled an explanation that Ianto could barely understand. His eyes drifted shut then suddenly flew open as he grabbed Ianto's wrist hard. "Ianto, don't go. I don't want to lose you, not now."

Ianto brushed the hair from his face and smiled softly, leaning closer. "I'm just going to go get the coordinates. You won't even know I'm gone." 

"Of course I will," Jack murmured. "You better come back." 

"Of course I will," Ianto parroted back at him. "It's only a bit of time travel. How hard can it be?"

Jack laughed, but it turned into an ugly cough; obviously his chest was still hurting. "Don't mess with time, Ianto. If you do, the Reapers will destroy everything. You can't save her…just get the coordinates…" Jack closed his eyes; his body needed to heal, and it was fairly obvious that they didn't have time to wait for him. There was a sound nearby, and six aliens materialized on the other end of the clearing. Ianto had to do it; it was his only choice. 

Thinking as quickly as he could, he tried to find the best moment in time to program into the manipulator. His mind drifted back to the moment he had woken up: he remembered running out of the Hub, Gwen gasping, and Tosh calling his name. Yet closing his eyes, he did not recall seeing Tahlia anywhere until he'd got in the car with her much later. And she had looked at him so differently, so oddly, so sadly.

Because that was it: she had known. She had known then what was going to happen. 

"Shit," Ianto swore. All the cryptic remarks, everything, pointed to the only solution: he had to go back in time to her to get the coordinates. And when he did, Tahlia would suss out that something was going to happen in the future. In fact, she was going to help make it happen. What had she said in the car? 'You'd have made a good Time Agent. You'll figure it out. It's all set when you do.' It was all set. He looked down at the manipulator. He didn't need Tosh's best guess or Jack's half conscious instructions. Tahlia had done it for him: he knew without a doubt that she had programmed the manipulator to take him back to the right moment, the moment in time when he found her in the past in order to save the future.

He hesitated only briefly. Jack had said not to mess with time, and Ianto was well aware of the possible consequences. He would simply pop in, get the location for the Shadow Proclamation, then return to his own time. One of them would then have to take the device and explain to the Shadow Proclamation what had happened, something Tahlia would not be able to do now. 

There was, in all likelihood, the very real possibility that she would work out that something had happened to her, so Ianto would have to be very careful with his questions and answers. And yet he knew he had to do it because he was fairly certain he already had from the way Tahlia had reacted to him in the car. Which didn't make any sense to him, since he hadn't done it yet at that point in time, but then time was fluid, rippling and twisting, and the complex circle of a tense-tangling paradox was always present with time travel. 

"Right," he muttered to himself. He stood, turned on the manipulator, and punched the combination of buttons Jack had told him would activate the device. He knew he was leaving the others to defend themselves against the half a dozen new aliens now crossing the clearing toward them, but he would return to that same time and place and still be able to help them, so he put aside his guilt as best as he could.

Owen shouted as Ianto hit the final button and felt his very being begin to dissolve into millions of tiny pieces; it wasn't painful, but he was aware of it and it was like nothing he'd ever felt before. Yet before he could barely process it, he was reforming, his atoms coming back together with a prickly feeling that made him want to scratch at his skin.

When he felt solid again, Ianto glanced around and saw he was in the back of the Hub, alone near the stairs to the lower levels. He heard Jack bellow for Owen and peeked around the corner. The three woman were nowhere in sight at the moment. Glancing around, he listened to his past self start to have a panic attack after coming back to life and grimaced; how embarrassing.

Gwen and Tosh stepped out of the kitchen just in time to see Ianto's past self dash through the door, Jack following after him. They looked at one another in shock before hurrying over to the medical bay. Tahlia appeared then, glancing around the Hub as if sensing something important had just happened. Ianto took a deep breath and called out to her. 

She turned and glanced at him in surprise before eyeing the cog door his past self had just run out through. Looking him up and down, she spotted the manipulator on his wrist and frowned. He glanced down and sighed; maybe he should have taken it off immediately, but at least now she would be more likely to believe him than to dismiss him as some sort of alien intruder. He motioned her away from the main Hub, and she followed him warily. 

"You're alive," she said by way of greeting once they were far enough away from the main section of the hub. "Both of you." 

He snorted through his nose. Yes, there were currently two of him in this timeline. He'd never time traveled before and it was a bit difficult to wrap his mind around, to be honest. Tahlia crossed her hands over her chest and narrowed her eyes at him, raising an eyebrow when she noticed his injured shoulder.

"Care to explain what's going on?" she asked, her light voice belying the tension in her eyes. "Like why you have my vortex manipulator strapped to your arm?" 

"Short story, yes: I survived. I just ran out the door. Or my past self did, I suppose." She nodded in understanding; of course she would, she had been a Time Agent. "I'm from a bit in the future, and I need something." 

"So you stole my wrist strap to come back and get it?" she asked rather archly. "Must be important to mess with time like that."

He glanced down at it again. "Borrowed," he amended. "And yes, it is." Before he could say anymore, a sudden thought occurred to him. 

"The team will be called out soon. You'll have to go with them and bring your wrist strap with you so I can borrow it to get here." He paused. "Do you have it? Or is it on your ship?"

She rolled up her sleeve to reveal the small wrist strap, thinner and sleeker than Jack's, but obviously the same one Ianto was currently wearing. "Right," he said. "You've had it all along."

With a shrug, Tahlia crossed her arms over her chest. "Never leave home without it. I like it unnoticeable, though. So what do you need so badly that you jumped back in time to get?"

"A set of coordinates," Ianto replied, watching her face closely. 

"For what?" she asked. Again she sounded suspicious, and Ianto couldn't blame her. 

"The location of the Shadow Proclamation. We need to get the stolen device there as soon as possible."

"Why?" she asked bluntly. "What went wrong?"

A very pointed look most likely answered for him, but Ianto spoke anyway. "You know I can't tell you," he said as gently as he could.

"Your being here tells me something, though," she said, and he nodded, knowing it was likely true. "So you've changed the timeline without even saying anything." 

"Then hopefully the universe won't implode," he said with a wry smile.

"It's not the universe I'm worried about, it's the Reapers." 

Ianto frowned. "That's what Jack said. What are Reapers?" 

"They repair rips in time—fix mistakes and undo paradoxes." She waited for him to digest that, and when he nodded, she continued. "If this becomes one of those points, they will devour everything and everyone involved to fix it. It's their job." 

"Devour?" asked Ianto, suddenly understanding Jack's worry before he'd left. 

"Literally," said Tahlia softly, and a haunted look appeared in her eyes. "I've seen it happen. You had better hope that coming back for that information doesn't leave too much behind that changes the future you just jumped from."

Ianto had thought about that; he had even considered that Tahlia, as a former Time Agent, would be clever enough to figure something out. He had not, however, anticipated disrupting the entire space-time continuum just to save his planet from aliens bent on retrieving the prototype of a weapon that could take over the galaxy. 

Sometimes the responsibility of Torchwood was too much, it really was.

"I need to get to the Shadow Proclamation as soon as possible," he said, deciding to reveal as many half-truths as he could. "Your ship was destroyed, you're unconscious, and Jack is dead. My team is about to be attacked so we need to turn over the device before the entire planet is at risk." 

She took a deep breath, held it, and blew it out with a nod. "Give me the wrist strap. I'll program them in."

Ianto raised an eyebrow, and she rolled her eyes in answer. "Trust me. I'm not going to send you into the center of a star or something." 

Remembering that Jack had once done the same thing to an alien, but also remembering what Jack had said about Tahlia having more of a conscience than any of his fellow Time Agents, Ianto nodded and handed her the vortex manipulator. 

Her fingers ran quickly across the buttons in a well-practiced motion, so similar to Jack that Ianto was fascinated. "All right, I've programmed in three sets of coordinates—space and time." Ianto nodded and stepped closer so he could see what she was doing. Her eyes flickered up to his before quickly moving back toward the wrist strap. "First one will get you back to where you came from. What time?" He told what time he'd left and she punched a few more buttons. "Okay, I'm sending you back a few minutes earlier, just to be safe. The second set will get you to the asteroids where the Shadow Proclamation maintains their offices. And the third will get you back to Earth." 

She once more turned to him, her face inches from his. "Anything else?"

He smiled sadly at her, knowing she had likely figured out her fate but also knowing there was nothing he could tell her to really stop it from happening. It already had, so he had to let it happen again. That was the hard part of time travel, then; no wonder Jack didn't seem to miss it.

"I need the original device," he said suddenly. "So that when I go back I can get it to the Shadow Proclamation."

She frowned. "Or we could just take it there straight from here, forget about all this nonsense."

Ianto shook his head; that didn't feel right. "No, I don't think that's a good idea. If we did turn out to need it, how would I explain having already got rid of it in the past?"

"Did you?" she asked. "Need it?"

He frowned. "No, but it's not over yet. I left as more aliens materialized. We might still need it as leverage if things go badly."

"All right," she said, sounding reluctant. "Good point." She finally smiled and bumped him with her shoulder. "You'd make a good Time Agent, Ianto Jones." 

"Funny, you've said that before," he murmured.

"Said it already or going to say it?" she asked, and there was a twinkle in her eye now. Maybe that's why Jack had enjoyed time travel: it was a headache, but the challenge of the vocabulary alone was intriguing.

"Can't answer that either," Ianto laughed. "Anyway, I'd better take it with me." 

Tahlia shook her head, and before he could protest, she explained. "You can't walk in there and grab it now, they just watched you run out. I'll bring it with me so it's there already."

Ianto remembered something else from the car: "I've already got it," she had said. "Seemed prudent. Quicker get away." And this was the moment she had got the idea, when he'd come back in time and mentioned it. Brilliant. 

An alarm went off on one of the computers in the hub. "That would be the outer space phone call," Ianto murmured. "You're going to be leaving in a few minutes. So is there anything I'm forgetting?" he asked. 

She closed her eyes as if thinking hard. When she opened them, she was smiling slyly. "Just this," she murmured, and she kissed him hard, on the lips. And even though he wasn't in Jack's body anymore, Ianto couldn't help but respond. It felt different in his own skin, and yet so similar. And really, she was incredibly attractive and almost as good at kissing as Jack.

He finally pulled away and smiled back at her. "It'll be all right," he said softly, simply because he felt like he needed to say it, if only to reassure himself. It wouldn't be all right, not for her, but he had to lie, even it was for his own piece of mind.

"I know," she said, and she touched his lips with another smile. "You're a good kisser in this body too. Jack is a lucky man."

Ianto rolled his eyes.

"I'll leave you two the silk sheets," she whispered in his ear, and he swallowed thickly at the thought of it.

"Tahlia!" yellowed Owen. "We need to get Jack and Ianto! There's a contingent of nasty aliens banging on our door who want their toy back."

"Coming!" she shouted before turning back to Ianto. "Gotta go." She grinned, though it looked sadder now, slightly less vibrant.

"Don't forget the weapon," he said, and she nodded. 

"I won't." She lifted his wrist, fingers hovering over the buttons of her manipulator. Her eyes flickered to his shoulder. "You're not immortal anymore, are you?" 

He shook his head. "Be careful, then," she said. "You're important to him, you know."

"I'll do my best," he replied, swallowing thickly at her words. She pressed the button for him and stepped back, and he felt his atoms disintegrate once more as he left the Hub—and the recent past—behind him to materialize in the park he had left behind only moments earlier.

Tahlia had sent him back a few minutes early. Not enough to save her, but enough to watch his past self lean over Jack and glance back at the strange light near the edge of the woods that was him materializing. He watched as his past self walked first to Gwen and Tahlia, then to Tosh and Owen, and finally back to Jack. The six new aliens materialized at the other end of the clearing. His past self turned, made his decision (as he knew he already had) and disappeared into the past.

Gwen and Owen stood up to face the six new aliens. Ianto saw Tosh crouching behind the shrub with her weapon as well, her face pinched with pain as she aimed. With the element of surprise, Ianto figured they could take them fast enough to avoid any more injuries. He strode quietly into the clearing and quickly took down two green-skinned aliens. Gwen and Owen immediately began firing at the others. One turned to fire at Ianto, but Tosh somehow stumbled to her feet and hit him in the back.

It was over in seconds: six more aliens on the ground, and Torchwood still standing, somehow.

Ianto nodded at Gwen and Owen; before they could even ask him what had happened, he motioned to them to get the weapons, and they began going around the clearing checking on the bodies and picking up the alien tech. Ianto hurried over to Tahlia to get the original body-swapping weapon. Yet when he bent over her body and reached out to wherever she may have hidden it, he was shocked to see her eyes fly open. A finger flew to her lips, the intent obvious in her eyes: she did not want him to say anything. He did his best to stifle a gasp as he bent closer.

"Give me the manipulator," she whispered, barely moving.

"You've changed the timeline," he hissed, a rush of panic flowing through him as he glanced around for the anticipated Reapers.

"No, you changed it when you came back," she hissed back. "Did you really think I wouldn't suspect anything? And at least try to protect myself from whatever sent you backward in time?"

Ianto stared at her; she certainly seemed uninjured. "How?" he asked. "You hardly had enough time to prepare." 

She rolled her eyes. "I am a time traveler, Ianto. I had plenty of time to prepare. Which you don't. Give me the manipulator." 

"I should go," Ianto said, shaking his head. "Or Jack. You're hurt." 

"I'm fine," she said. "Personal ion shield. And I know what I'm dealing with. Now give it to me so I can get this thing off the planet already and end this ridiculous adventure. I'll even go back earlier so you're protected by the time this happens." 

Ianto glanced over his shoulder; the others hadn't noticed him talking to Tahlia yet. He took off the strap and wrapped it around her wrist again. "It's the next set of—" he started, and she laughed lightly.

"I know," she said. "I programmed it an hour ago, remember?"

"It was only about ten minutes for me," he murmured.

"That's time travel for you," she replied. 

"Are the Reapers going to be…upset about this?" he asked. She shook her head.

"I don't think so. You went back because it was obvious to you that you had already gone back, which meant I already knew what to do—nothing changed, it happened the way it was supposed to happen." She paused. "Only a bit out of order." 

Ianto shook his head, glad to be back in the right and proper time. "Go, then. Before things really get complicated." 

"Oh, this was nothing," she said, finally sitting up. She winced a bit, obviously sore from where the blast had hit her shield. "But it was fun." 

A raised eyebrow preceeded a snort. "It was something, that's for sure."

She studied him closely before placing a palm against his face. "You did good, Ianto Jones." She pressed a soft kiss to his lips, much like the one from moments earlier back at the Hub. "Now go see to Jack and make sure he's not too pissed off when he wakes up." She paused. "You're good for him, you know." 

Ianto shrugged and glanced over his shoulder again. "Maybe." 

"You are," she insisted. "I've barely known you a week, and I can see it. You're both willing to die for one another. For a man who can't die, that might not seem like a big deal, but for the Jack Harkness I knew, it is. And for a man who can die, it's a beautiful, amazing thing."

He stared at her, slightly speechless. "You're making it out to be more than what it is." 

"No, I'm not. I'm merely pointing out what I see as an objective observer." She smiled. "Don't let this change things, Ianto. Use it for the better." 

She nodded once and reached toward her wrist strap, adjusting a few settings; he stopped her before she could leave. 

"Why did you jump in front of me?" he asked suddenly, though he suspected he already knew the answer. She glanced at him in surprise.

"Because I knew you were mortal again," she said. "You couldn't die then because you hadn't gone back to see me yet." 

He shook his head in confusion at that last. "Right. Well, thank you," he said, and he returned the kiss she had given him earlier, this time on her cheek. "You saved my life."

"You saved mine," she pointed out. 

"And no Reapers," Ianto replied. 

"No Reapers," she echoed. 

He cleared his throat. "Can you let us know how it turns out? Get us a message or something?"

"I will, I promise. Maybe I'll even come visit sometime," she said softly. "Get my sheets back, along with my money." 

"Anytime," said Ianto with a smile. "And I'm sorry about your ship."

"No worries, I took care of it. And I've got this." She patted her wrist strap. "Good-bye, Ianto. Tell Jack he's still an idiot, but not half as much if he sticks with you."

"I'll tell him," Ianto replied. He let go of her wrist, she smiled, and with one last push of a button, she was gone. He let his head fall, exhausted.

The flash of light must have caught the others' attention. Gwen was suddenly by his side. "Ianto?" she asked, kneeling next to him. "Are you all right?

He nodded slowly as he stood. "I'm fine. It worked. Everything's over." 

Gwen frowned as she glanced around the area. "What worked? Where's Tahlia's body? What happened?"

Ianto walked slowly over to Jack and took him in his arms once more, hoping he would regain consciousness soon. "It's a long story," he said, feeling more tired than he thought he should. "Although it really only took about ten minutes."

"Did you mess up the timeline?" asked Jack in a raspy voice, regaining consciousness quietly for once. Ianto smiled down at him, then leaned in to give him a quick kiss, not caring what Gwen or any of the others saw. 

"Nope. I just followed it the way I was supposed to, apparently." 

Jack started to sit up, nodding thoughtfully. "One of those 'you knew what to do because you'd already done it' kind of things?" 

"I think so," said Ianto. Gwen stared back and forth between them.

"What happened, Ianto?" she demanded. "I don't understand."

"I'm not sure I do either," said Ianto. "But I can tell you that it's gone, and no one will be bothering us."

Jack narrowed his eyes. "You didn't go to the Shadow Proclamation yourself, did you?"

"Oh no." Ianto laughed, a release of nervous tension more than anything. "Tahlia did."

Gwen turned to stare at the ground where Tahlia had been moments earlier. "But she was dead!" Gwen said. "What happened?"

Jack raised an eyebrow at Ianto. "You told her. 

"I didn't!" Ianto protested, then shrugged. "But apparently she took it upon herself to put on some sort of personal shield, therefore the shot that hit her didn't kill her like we thought it did."

"So we could have just waited for her to wake up then. You didn't need to go back," said Gwen, still sounding confused.

"She wouldn't have had the shield if he hadn't," said Jack. "That's the trick with time travel."

"No Reapers, though," Ianto murmured. Owen appeared then, helping Tosh limp toward them.

"What the hell are Reapers?" he asked. "Because that doesn't sound good, and after all this I really don't want to face something with a name like that. 

Ianto glanced at Jack, eyebrow raised. Jack grinned. "Reapers clean up time paradoxes," he said, but didn't offer anything else. Gwen still looked confused, though Tosh nodded. 

"Did you screw up the timeline, then?" asked Owen. Tosh elbowed him.

"I think he saved us, you prat," she told him, and for once Owen looked surprised, though whether it was because of Ianto's actions or Tosh's words, it was hard to tell. 

"I think he did," murmured Jack. "Him and Tahlia. But what about our other situation?" He glanced around the clearing at the host of dead aliens littering the ground. "Someone is not going to like this." 

"Tahlia said she would—" started Ianto, but he was interrupted by a loud crackling sound followed by an odd blue light that coalesced into the shapes of several large, thick-skinned aliens that looked suspiciously like walking rhinoceri.

Everyone except Jack had their weapons up immediately. 

"Stand down!" he said, dragging himself to his feet with a grimace.

One of the aliens turned its hands palm upwards. "We mean you no harm," it said through what was obviously some sort of translation device. 

Owen snorted. "That's what they all say." 

The alien ignored him. "Captain Jack Harkness?" it asked instead, and Jack stepped forward. 

"That would be me," he said, that rare tone of cautious deference coloring his voice. "Thank you for coming so quickly."

"Jack," hissed Gwen. "What's going on?"

"These are the Judoon," Jack said, motioning at the aliens. Now that Ianto looked closely, they were all wearing identical uniforms and though they were carrying weapons, there was no hint of open hostility about them. "They work for the Shadow Proclamation."

"We spoke with the human Tahlia Blake," said the leader. "She delivered the weapon you recovered and informed us of your situation. We are here under Article 57 to ensure you are no longer threatened."

Ianto stared at the strange alien, his open mouth matching that of the others. Jack simply inclined his head. "I know how rare it is for you to come to this planet. We thank you for your assistance."

The alien showed little expression in its response. "Thank you, Captain Harkness. You were correct in reporting the weapon. It violates multiple articles of galactic law pertaining to both biological and spiritual free will. The Shadow Proclamation is taking action against the creators of the prototype device." 

"It wasn't our idea," said Ianto from where he stood next to Jack. "It was Tahlia Blake. She pursued it here in order to turn it over to you. Is she safe?" 

Jack gave him a funny look that Ianto ignored. The Judoon captain nodded. "She is safe. She will remain under our protection for now. Already the creators of the device are angry about its loss and are searching for her."

"Keep her safe," said Jack. "She deserves it." 

"We will, Captain," the Judoon replied. "Are you in need of any assistance here?"

Jack turned and glanced around the clearing. "What should we do with them? I'm afraid most of them are dead."

"We will deal with the bodies as well as any captive survivors," said the Judoon leader. He handed Jack a small box. "Tahlia Blake asked us to give you. She said it was to express her gratitude."

Jack frowned at the alien. "Thanks? She's the one who saved us." 

The Judoon showed no emotion as he shook his head. "I do not know, only that I was instructed to give it to you." 

Jack glanced at a tag on the box, then handed it to Ianto with a wink. "It's for you," he said. "And I bet I know exactly what it is."

"You are free to go, Captain Harkness," said the Judoon captain. "Attend to your wounded. We will inform you of our departure when we are finished here."

"Thank you," said Jack, and he sounded genuinely grateful. "We appreciate your assistance." Turning to the others, he offered them a weary smile. "Come on kids, let's go home. We've got some covering up to do." 

Gwen and Owen helped Tosh limp back to the SUV as the Judoon moved out into the clearing to begin cleaning up. For once Ianto was more than glad that Torchwood could hand off the job, even if it was to an alien police force. He walked closely with Jack, bumping arms and elbows until Jack finally took his hand and squeezed. 

"You did good," he said. Ianto shrugged; he'd done what he had to do. Jack shook his head with a smile at Ianto's attitude. "I'm glad you came back," he said softly. Ianto frowned at that.

"Why wouldn't I?" he asked, wondering if Jack had expected him to fail, or worse, get killed.

Jack shrugged, but Ianto could tell it was not as casual as it looked. "Oh, I don't know. Time travel and beautiful women can be tempting." 

"You would know, wouldn't you?" murmured Ianto, not meeting Jack's curious gaze, though he was smiling now. Jack hadn't been worried about Ianto failing, then; he'd been worried about Ianto staying. 

"I do," Jack replied honestly.

"You came back," Ianto pointed out.

"I did."

"There's your answer." Ianto stumbled slightly, fatigue starting to catch up to him, and to his surprise, Jack wrapped an arm around his shoulder, minding the hastily wrapped injury on his shoulder.

"What do you mean?" asked Jack. 

Ianto sighed, wishing he didn't have to spell it out after all they had been through. "I walked that mile and then some, Jack, but I prefer my own life, not yours. Even when it comes to time travel and beautiful women."

A kiss was pressed to his head, surprising him even more. "And I prefer mine, as long as you walk with me." 

Together they continued toward the SUV, back to their own lives, in their own bodies. Back to their normal…yet also to something very different. 

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I am no expert on the Shadow Proclamation and the Judoon, so I hope that rings true. Nor am I an expert on temporal physics and time travel, but it was too much fun to pass up. I love trying to write time travel, for all the headaches it gives me.
> 
> I hope you enjoyed this story. Comments and reviews are always so appreciated by authors, so do let me know what you thought! Thank you for all the kudos, and thank you for reading!


End file.
